


The Staff

by my_gender_is_5_bucks_and_a_d20



Series: Alushtas [2]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game)
Genre: Action, Comedy, Dimensions, Fantasy, Gen, Not mcuh, TWO WORDS, but a little, but they're language, some language
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-14 20:02:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 31,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28551327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/my_gender_is_5_bucks_and_a_d20/pseuds/my_gender_is_5_bucks_and_a_d20
Summary: After stealing a magical staff, Alushtas and Robin find themselves on Earth. They must travel between different dimensions to make it back home, and pick up a few friends along the way.
Series: Alushtas [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2088585
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	1. Warming Up

**1**

Pebbles skittered as I clung to the side of the building. “This isn’t exactly what I had in mind this evening,” I said, as I made my way around the large edifice. 

“Hey,” I asked Robin suddenly, “how many synonyms for ‘building’ can you think of?”

He blinked at me. “Why are you asking me this _right now_?”

I shrugged. “I dunno.”

He let out a long, exasperated sigh. “We are literally in the middle of a job, and you’re asking me about _building synonyms_?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then. Let me see...um…construction, edifice, hut, architecture, domicile, home, erection, framework, I guess.”

“Hmmm, most of those wouldn’t work for this exact building. I mean, nobody would really call a tavern a _home_ , do you?”

He looked at me, and replied, “First of all, I know you are a good thief, but most don’t make chat during the job. That’s typically reserved for afterwards.”

“What can I say, I’m a special person.”

He sighed, and said, “You got that right. And most taverns don’t have 4 stories. Remind me, why _is_ this one so tall?”

I shrugged, and told him, “I’m not sure, a lot of customers, I guess. It isn’t known as the best tavern for 500 kilometers for nothing. Most only get about 10 guests a night, this one gets almost 75.”

“We should really focus on the task we have on hand, don’t you think?”

I sighed, and said, “Fine. But how much farther do we have to go, anyway?” He reminded me that we had three more rooms to go by before we got to the correct one, and we continued on our way, slowly making progress, just two friends vibing on the wall of a dark tavern. As we were edging our way to our destination, I quietly said, “we need music. Where’s our bard?”

Robin _quite_ exasperatedly replied, “ _Dude,_ we are _literally_ thieves trying to be _sneaky_ and _quiet_ so that we aren’t _caught_ . We definitely _don’t_ need a bard right now.”

“But what if we get caught and we need to seduce the halfling?”

“We _aren’t_ going to get caught. The only way we would get caught would be if we had a _bard_ that would make so much noise that _everyone_ in the tri-state area would awaken.”

That’s fair enough. Well then, I shall hum under my breath.”

“ **Do not hum under your breath**.”

“Fine.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**2**

Each of the rooms had a small balcony, which made moving across them easier. The beginning was the hardest, because we didn’t start with a balcony, but once we got to the first, we could move across it and then jump to the next. We didn’t always make it all the way, but we were careful enough to jump close enough to the wall so that we could land on the small strip of extruded wall and not fall to our likely deaths. I tried multiple times to make small talk, but Robin was not in the mood. He apparently was ‘focused on the mission’ and ‘didn’t have time for my nuisances’. As we got closer, I got quieter, until we were on the correct balcony.

“Now remember,” Robin said seriously, staring me in the eyes, “This particular barbarian is very dangerous. You already know this, but I think I should refresh your memory, just in case you decide to do things because ‘you only live once’. He is one of those very special barbarians that we’ve been tracking, one that covers himself in those runes. They will amplify his strength, and go even crazier than normal.

“Under _no_ circumstances are you to wake him up, do you understand me? He will rip us to shreds, and I’m too pretty to die. To be honest, I don’t think we should be doing this anyway. A little talisman isn’t worth this kind of risk.”

“It is when that ‘little talisman’ could turn him into a hulking rage monster, should he handle it improperly,” I rebuked.

“Oh, so we’re Good Samaritans now, making sure he doesn’t destroy stuff? Maybe we should go down and kill us some dark elves while we’re at it, or go after bandits for the lols.”

“Come on man, it’s not like that. I just don’t want to die because of him, and plus, that talisman can fetch a hefty price. We’re gonna need money if we’re going to succeed in nabbing that staff, didn’t we agree?”

“Yeah, speaking of which, didn’t I only agree to that _one_ theft? The only reason I’m here is because, and I quote, ‘I’d make a mess of things if I went in by myself, and we really need the money it’ll fetch if we’re going to take that staff.’ You haven’t even told me why the staff is special. You’ve been really evasive about it.”

“I promise, it’s for a good reason. Now, let’s focus on what we’re doing here. We need to be careful, and we’re burning moonlight,” I told him. We carefully brushed aside the curtains so we could peer into the room, and saw that the barbarian was lying on his bed, half-naked, his runes glowing softly in the darkness. We started using a system of hand signals to communicate, similar to, but simpler than, the hand code of the drow. We walked softly into the room, my enchanted boots making not a sound, Robin’s normal ones making barely more. We crept through the room, being careful about potential dangers, but not too worried, as barbarians almost never set up defenses because of their overconfidence. I walked toward the closet, which was covered with a curtain, which I pulled back. There was nothing to note, other than a wicked club which was studded with sharp-looking metals. I left everything where it was, except for an orange I found in a bag. Robin clicked softly to get my attention, and then gestured toward the barbarians chest. The talisman lay there, shrouded by chest fur, and quite obviously unobtainable. To try would be to wake up the beast of a man, which was like inviting Death itself into your home.

“I’m going to snatch it and run,” I signalled, to which Robin replied, “NO. No you are not.”

“Get out of here,” I said while creeping toward him, “I know I can make it out, but only if you aren’t here. Go, and I’ll follow.”

He rolled his eyes, but went out onto the balcony and started climbing down. I plotted what I would do, which ended up being pretty simple. I’d yank it off his thick neck, then run and try to jump to the next building. I went to the balcony, and noted the distance to the shop next door, as well as the fact that Robin had made it down safely. I walked back to the sleeping form, and readied myself. _Just reach down and take it. By the time he would awake and come after you, you’ll be on the next roof, making your grand escape, and he’ll never know it was you. Go on. Do it._ I carefully reached through the hair, and wrapped my fist around the magical thing. I pulled it off his meaty neck and tried to run, but his fist was around my neck before I had taken a step. 

He growled at me, very angrily, as the runes started to glow brighter. He marched over to the balcony, and threw me as hard as he could, which was a bit of an inconvenience, but also helpful, because it meant I was no longer near him and his strong grasp. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**3**

I hit the ground painfully, groaning. Why did being thrown have to _hurt_ so much? I heard someone running toward me, but couldn’t muster the strength to look at them.

“This is bad, this is bad, this is bad, why did I agree to this, this stupid idiot probably got himself killed, and now I have no one to talk to,” I heard a familiar voice say. Robin knelt down next to me, and, with concern in his eyes, asked me, “hey, are you okay? You’re bleeding quite a lot.” I laughed, and replied, “Yeah, but you should see the other truck. He’s really quite strong, and I don’t think I used that idiom, or whatever, correctly. Anyway, I should probably see a doctor or something, because everything hurts. Also, what’s your last name? I feel like we should tell each other this, because we’re so close. Mine’s Naïlo.”

He looked at me, and said, “Yeah, this is bad. You only ramble this badly when you are trying to take my attention away from something else. In this case, I think you’re trying to keep me from noticing that your foot is backwards.”

I raised my head, and looked down at my body. “My foot is backwards? Huh. That’s why it hurts this much. I thought it was just my entire body. Yeah, we should get to a doctor.”

He grabbed under my arms, and tried to lift me. “OW! Ow, ow, ow. Yeah, that isn’t gonna work,” I said. “Maybe grab a stretcher, or bring a healing mage here?”

“Fine.” He left to do that, and I just laid there, looking up at the stars and wondering why I did things like this. Probably because I’m an idiot. It was actually kinda nice here, kinda calm, relaxing, other than the pool of blood that was getting larger around me and the utter pain my body was going through. Eventually, I fell unconscious.

  
  
  


*

When I came to, Robin was kneeling over me, as well as a second person that I could only assume was a mage, considering that my body no longer hurt as much. 

“Hey,” I said, “is it as bad as it felt?”

“Luckily, no,” he responded, staring at my abdomen instead of my face. The mage stood up, and held out his (to be honest, I have no idea their gender, I never found out, so I’m using male pronouns) hand, demanding payment. Robin handed over a couple gold coins, and the mage left. He helped me stand up, and though I wobbled for a few seconds, I quickly recovered.

“Well, that went well,” I told him, showing him the talisman I had stored in a secret pocket of my clothes. He laughed, and we started to walk back to the guild. “Hey, so what does it _do_ , anyway?” he asked, as he stretched his body toward the sky.

“I have no clue, but I’m sure our client is a good person. She had a good demeanor, don’t you think?”

Robin sighed, and responded, “The only reason she gave us this job was because she had heard your reputation. She literally threatened to cave your skull in.”

I spread my hands, my hair turning pink. “She only said that because I pointed out she had a bird in her hair. What was I supposed to do, _not_ stare at it?”

“She was a druid, obviously. Yes, they don’t typically threaten people, but it is possible she likes animals and hates the more sentient life.”

“Eh, whatever. It’s probably like a spirit gem or whatever druids like. Likely unimportant to us.”

*

We returned to the guild, slept through the rest of the night, and the next morning set out to find the druid. We found her at a tavern, one a few blocks away from the one we had visited that night. She was at a corner table, staring into her mead and probably thinking some nature-esque thoughts, I don’t know what druids think. When we got close, she quickly looked up at us, looking scared.

“Do you have it?” she asked hurriedly, grabbing at my arm.

“Chill, yes, I have it,” I replied, and took out the talisman. I hadn’t really taken a close look at it before, as I had been busy getting tossed around and/or knocked out. It had the imprint of a unicorn on it, and it seemed to be made of some kind of silver or other such material. She swiped it from my grasp, and just as I was moving toward her, indignant, she pushed a bag toward me. I opened it, saw that it had the correct amount of payment, and looked back up. She had disappeared, which wasn’t surprising, considering how paranoid she had acted, and so Robin took the bag and we left.

When we got back to the guild, we sorted out the reward. It was sizable, perhaps a little more than the amount of work we went to, or at least the amount of work Robin had gone to. 

“So, what happens now?” he asked me.

“Well, right now? I am going to go get a new blade,” I responded, “and then another job.”

“Why do you need a new blade? The one you have works fine,” he asked me. I tossed my current sword at him, and replied, “Yes, but I’ve had that one a while now and I’ve been looking at a magical one for a while now. Well, I’m off.”

As I left the guild, I passed Sylvan, a male elf who has constantly tried to one-up me, even though I couldn’t care less about him. I ignored him, even when he tossed his half-eaten sandwich at me. He’s a real jerk, and is probably just intimidated by me. At least, that’s what I’ll keep telling myself until I finally decide to do something.

I found myself at Durtor’s blacksmith shop, which looked the same as pretty much any other blacksmith’s, except with a bit more magic, as Durtor’s specialty was enchanting. He greeted me, and I replied in kind. He asked me, “What do you want, Alushtas? That blade I gave you was supposed to last at least a decade, and it’s barely been two years.”

“That is true, and it was a good blade, but I desire something else. It is fairly special, and will most certainly be expensive, but I’m sure I can pay.”

“Ah? So what’ll it be?”

“I’m not sure exactly what it is called, but I want a sword that can shift dimensions according to my will, such that it will disappear and reappear when I want, if that makes sense.”

“Hmm… I think I know what you are talking about, and you are correct in that it will be expensive. I can make such a blade in about a week, or, if you would rather enchant an existing sword, it would probably take about 2 days to properly set. Which will it be?”

“I want a new blade. You know that the newer a weapon is, the better the enchantment will be. Also, I know you are always working on improving yourself, and I am confident a new sword will be well worth the price.”

Durtor nodded, and turned away. “I’d better get started,” he said, as he moved through his workspace. “But there are a few things I need to know.”

I gave him the necessary information. I wanted, actually, two blades, a shortsword and a longsword, which would “take a bit longer, probably closer to two weeks. This is the stuff you need to tell me at the beginning, okay?” They were to be made out of mithril, a rare ore that “really drives up the price, are you sure? Other metals are pretty good too. Really? Okay, okay, fine.” A few other details were necessary, but not really important for just anyone to know.

Over the next two weeks, I did a few more jobs, but nothing very exciting. I was really just filling the time until I could have my new blades, which I had decided to call my ‘vorpal blades’, because it sounded cool, even though an actual vorpal blade simply could decapitate a person and any of mine could do that if necessary.

  
  
  
  
  


**4**

After the two weeks, I went to pick up my new weapons. It was a Mountday, and I was, to be perfectly honest, quite excited. I had never had magical blades, as I had thought them unnecessary, but I had made an exception for these. 

“You must bind them to your will,” Durtor told me, “or else they will never obey you.” That seemed kinda obvious to me, but hey, it was a fair assumption about my intelligence. “What do I need to do, anyway?”

“You must take hold of one of the swords, with both hands.” I did so, feeling like a paladin or something. “Now, press the tip into your forehead, enough to take a drop of blood.”

“This sounds painful, but most rituals are.”

“Yes, blood is a powerful bonding tool. Now just do it already.” I moved the longsword until the cool metal of the tip rested against my head, and then pressed it as Durtor had told me to. A drop of blood fell onto the blade, and ran down it until it hit the guard, where it soaked in. I felt a shiver go down my spine, as a feeling of openness surrounded me.

“You may feel overwhelmed by the many strange feelings coming over you. This is a synchronicity with the sword, which shares with you the vast feeling of many dimensions. No matter where you go, this blade will follow you, and you will control its power. It is a weapon sought after by many, though as long as you live, only you will be its master. Guard it well, for it is a great tool, and it will guard you as well. Now, the other one.”

We did the same process with the shortsword, including Durtor’s speech, which probably contained power in and of itself. Following that, I followed him to the training arena, where several magical fighters stood at attention. They were unintelligent dummies, set at several levels, for fighting against, both newbies and veterans with weapons. I selected ones about middling level, so that I could practice with these different swords. In addition to the two vorpal blades, I had shield-like protection on my forearms, leather armor on the rest of my body, a dagger hidden on the side of my boot, two more daggers in my coat, and a shortbow slung across my back, with a quiver of arrows. I walked into the arena, readied my swords, and called out to start. 

Two dummies ran at me from an archway, one with a hand and a half sword, the other with a club. I quickly checked around me to make sure that no other enemies were coming, and, reassured that these were the only ones here, moved such that the one with the club was directly in front of the sword dummy, thus giving myself one target at a time. 

The dummy swung the club at me, which I easily dodged back to avoid, then I rushed forward and plunged the longsword into its chest. It lurched to the side, and I phased my blade so that I wouldn’t be knocked off balance. The sword only contained the weight of the handle when phased, which was good to know, so that I wouldn’t overcommit myself or make a mistake based on weight, and I rolled to the side to dodge the next swing. 

Almost too late, I remembered the other dummy, and moved my arm shield to block the strike I heard coming from my left side. I brought my shortsword in, hooked the much larger sword with the guard, and braced myself. The dummy pushed hard, trying to use brute force to overpower my blade, when I moved my body to the side and phased my sword. The dummy fell, overbalanced, and I calmly stabbed it in the head, the only place capable of deactivating them. The club dummy was up now, and coming for me. It brought the club down hard, but I rolled to my right and quickly switched my blades (my typical arrangement is longsword right hand, shortsword left hand). I brought my longsword into the thing’s back, shoved it to the ground, and stabbed it in the head with the shortsword. The fight now over, the two dummies got up and went back to their storage area, waiting for the next fight.

“Impressive,” Robin said, walking up to me.

“Sloppy,” I corrected, panting, “but I can improve. Were you watching the entire fight?”

“First of all, I was talking about the swords themselves. _You_ , however, were terrible. Second of all, yes, I saw the whole thing. Making them come at you one at a time was a good idea, but you have to remember that they are both there. I saw your surprise when you had to block that sword dummy. Good move with the phasing out, though. Could be very useful in the future.”

I shook my head, amazed at what he had said. “Yes, that is why I got them. That is _exactly_ what I wanted.”

He raised his hands, shrugged, and replied, “Hey, I didn’t know what kind of swords you were going for. Two weeks ago, you just told me ‘I want a new magical blade and hey, here’s my current one because I’ve only had it for two years and don’t want it anymore’.”

“That was a pretty good impression of me. Good job,” I said, and he smiled. 

“Why do I even hang out with you?” he asked, “because all you do is the wrong or rash thing and never tell me anything.”

“It’s either my winning personality or the fact that you are the one that recruited me into the guild.”

“Well, it’s certainly not your personality.”

“Haha, very funny. Now, let’s go get us something else to do. I’m bored.”

*

We made our way to a tavern (taverns are great, they are like restaurants mixed with motels, aka motels with good food) and got some food, because it was about midday.

“Hey,” I said to get his attention, “you wanna steal from that dude I told you about right after telling you about getting these epic boots?”

Robin shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “Now, what about this mage do we need to know?”

“Well, they are very powerful and dangerous. Their name is Noxlumos, or the light in the darkness, which is all cool and all, but their staff is the good bit. I’m not sure if it teleports the user, or makes them invisible or what, but I know it doesn’t have a master because I’ve seen multiple people use it. They live at the edge of town, and I know they have very good defenses. We will have to be extremely cautious, but I think we can do it.”

He sighed. “Well, I’ve been waiting for a good reason to die, and this seems like it. Let’s do it.”


	2. Stealing the Staff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alushtas and Robin steal that oh-so-special staff from the mage and use it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a ROUGH DRAFT of my story!!!! This is in no way the final thing, that will be a separate group once I've edited and revised, added and taken away from this!!!

**5**

As per every mission we do, we had to get the necessary materials. I went to the blacksmith’s again, as well as a magical item shop and a general shop. I made a couple other stops, which aren’t necessary to mention, and I had all my equipment. I met up with Robin at the guild, and used our hand code to ask him whether he had the things I asked him to get. He said that he did, and we were ready to go. When we got near, we saw what we were up against.

They had a large house, more like a mansion, with grass out front, and a stone path up to it. It was very nice, except for the clay golem out front.

“Well, that makes things a bit more difficult,” I said.

“Wait, you  _ did _ scope this place out first, right? That’s how you knew what to get?” he asked, worriedly.

“Yes, I knew to scope the house out, but this is a new addition. Makes me wonder what else might be in there. Eh, no matter. We got this. Just need to sneak past a creature designed to not sneak.”

He sighed. “You know, I was joking when I said I was ready to die, but hey, whatever. Let’s do this.”

*

We crept around to the side of the house, and started to climb it. I made it to a second story window, which had actual  _ glass _ in it, went up onto the windowsill, and waited for Robin to join me.

“Now, I don’t know exactly what we’re going to find here. I know most of the defenses, but I can’t be 100% sure of everything, and the layout of the house and where the staff is isn’t really known to me, except for perhaps an idea based off of other houses of similar construction,” I told him.

“Okay, let’s just go. I’ve resigned myself to this fate, let’s get it over with,” he replied.

I used my shortsword to cut a hole in the glass (gotta love freshly sharpened blades!), and we quietly climbed through. We found ourselves in what looked like a bathroom, except everything was white. It seemed to be made of some kind of stone, like quartz, though much more fragile, from the way it felt. In fact, the entire room was like something out of a fantasy book, with many strange and unknown things in it. We were very confused by the whole thing, and so moved on. We went into the hallway, which was covered in rug-like material, like a carpet over the flooring. We neutralized any alarms we found, and almost activated a few before noticing them

‘This “mage” seems much more powerful than I thought’ Robin signalled at me.

‘Yes, it is possible he is a wizard, but I only knew he used magic, not exactly what kind,’ I responded. ‘Now be quiet. We don’t want to attract attention.’

We continued, looking through the rooms, finding many strange-looking things which we didn’t touch, for we did not know what they would do, and we were too smart to risk it. We found what appeared to be a kitchen, dining room, and living area, but no sign of the staff. Finally, we found a bedroom, which contained the wizard, sleeping in a large bed.

‘Since I have the magical boots and know what the staff looks like, I’ll head in. If I see the staff, I’ll signal you and grab it,’ I told him, and he nodded in agreement.

I crept into the room, careful to make sure my boots made not a sound. I looked around, but couldn’t immediately see the staff. I moved to the side of the bed and looked under it. Nothing was underneath, and so I turned toward the closet that was to the left of the entrance. It was full of wizard clothing, as one might expect, but there was something else that I could make out. It didn’t appear to be the staff, but I was curious. I moved close to the closet, and saw a bow.  _ Well,  _ I thought,  _ that is good to know, I suppose _ . I looked around again, and saw a chest on the other side of the room, which might contain something magical. I quietly moved toward it, and used one of my charms, which was supposed to  _ Detect Monsters _ . I had encountered a Mimic before, and had no desire to do so again, especially right next to a wizard. It seemed to be a normal chest, so I used a few more charms to check and neutralize any alarms I could find on it, oiled the hinges so it wouldn’t creak, and then it was time.

I reached for the chest, readied myself, and opened the lid quickly. It is always best to do certain things quickly, similar to ripping off a bandage. The chest opened smoothly, and didn’t seem to trigger any alarms, though I looked at the wizard to make sure they weren’t awake. I looked into the chest and - 

“Eureka,” I said under my breath, reaching in and taking out the staff. It was long, probably about 5 feet tall, and I couldn’t understand how it fit in the chest at first, until I realized it was a Chest of Compression, which made items smaller when they are put in them. It was fairly nondescript, a tall, wooden pole, except for the top, where the image of a spider stood, raised on all 8 legs, in bronze. On its abdomen was a gem, and its eyes were studded ruby. I had seen it before, and so knew it was the correct staff, as well as the thrill of power running through it. 

I moved back out into the hall after closing the lid of the chest carefully, and signalled to Robin that I had the staff, to which he replied, ‘Well, I think that’s obvious, considering the fact that you are holding it.’ I told him not to be a smart aleck, and we made our way back through the strange room to where we had entered. I wrapped the staff in cloth, strapped it to my back alongside my bow, and climbed back out the window. I quickly made my way down, and Robin followed. We crept away from the house, doing our best not to awaken the golem, and we must’ve done something right, because we made it all the way back to the guild without the beast coming after us.

  
  
  
  


**6**

The next day, Robin came over to my room. I had put the wrapped staff under my bed, where it had lain below me while I meditated. When he got there, I took out the staff, and slowly unwrapped it. In the daylight coming in from my window, we could better see the figure at the top. It was definitely a spider, and the crystal in its abdomen looked like a blue amethyst, in the shape of an hourglass.

“This almost definitely has some kind of symbolism or significance to it,” I said, “but I have no idea what. Eh, I’m sure it’ll come up again later.”

Robin sighed. “That’s a terrible way to go through life, but okay.”

“Come on, man, let’s see what it can do. Actually, scratch that. Let’s check it for malevolence, and  _ then _ use it!”

We left my room, and went to our wizard’s quarters. We handed him the staff, told him we found it in a shop and liked it, and asked him to check it for anything evil. He found nothing, except that it contained very potent magic, and wondered “what kind of shop will just  _ sell _ something this powerful?” We shrugged, and went back to my room.

“Well,  _ now _ can we try the stick?”

“Fine.”

I took out the staff, braced it against the floor, and gripped it with both hands.

“Do I have to say something, or will it just happen, or what?”

“Dude, I have no idea, you’re the one who saw people use it.”

“Okay, I think I just have to concentrate on… something… I’m not sure. Grab the staff as well, just in case, though.”

Robin grabbed the staff, just below where I was holding it, and I, not knowing what exactly I was doing, moved one of my hands and gripped the spider’s body in my hand, on top of the staff. A shiver went down my spine, similar to the thrill of power I felt when I first held it. One at a time, the spider’s legs moved, coming up for a second, and then settling back down on the staff. This freaked me out a bit, though I found that I couldn’t let go of it. 

By this point, I was having second thoughts, especially as a wind picked up, circling throughout the room, and the amethyst set in the spider began to glow. Robin had already started screaming, and I was panicking  _ a lot _ . My eyes wide, I tried to move away, but the staff was firmly stuck, attached to nothing, and I was attached to it, as was Robin. The room started to spin, or at least it appeared to, and colors were flying everywhere, reds and blues mixing and bathing the room in a multi-colored madness. The wind was at cyclone levels now, or so it felt, and my last thought before spinning into unconsciousness was,  _ Please mommy, let me off of this ride, it isn’t fun _ . I’m guessing I was a little loopy from whatever was happening.

*

When I woke up, I was in a field. It seemed to be farmland, though the crop was unknown to me. It was tall, almost as tall as me, with some kind yellow thing on the end of long, green stalks. As it hadn’t attacked me, I had to assume it was either a passive entity or inanimate. Robin was laying next to me, with the staff nearby. I quickly rewrapped the staff, which looked the same as before we tried to use it, and tried to wake Robin up.

“Robin!” I said, slapping his cheek, “we need to go!”

“Wh-what?” he said groggily, his eyes opening up slightly. “Where are we?”

I looked around, and saw that it was about midday here, as well. “I’m not sure, but I don’t think it’s anywhere good.”

He got to his feet, I put the staff on my back again, and we started off. After about 10 minutes of walking, we saw something resembling a house, which we stopped to look at, though it was entirely blue and the structure was different from most of the houses I had seen in my life. The closest I could think of was the wizard’s house that we had stolen the staff from, which did not fill me with confidence or excitement.

“Well, we might as well go in,” Robin said, and I sighed and started to walk toward it again. 

“Sure, while we’re here in this strange place, let’s go to the random house. That sounds like a great idea, yeah,” I said sarcastically, and we got to the door.

“Should we knock, sneak in, or what?” Robin asked me. I reached up and knocked, for I felt like being dangerous. A few seconds later, a woman answered the door. She was wearing strange fabric, and was very tan.

“Yeah? What do you want?” she asked exasperatedly, to which I replied, “Hello, um, where are we?” She blinked, and then laughed. 

“Yeah, a lot of folks get lost out in the country. Your car must’ve broken down, huh? Well, if you follow that road-” She gestured to the side, where a road lay “-for a few miles, you’ll find yourselves in Chicago. Were you going to a convention of some kind? I didn’t know there  _ was _ a Comic-Con going on around here, but I’m not really that kind of gal, so what do I know? Nice costumes, you must’ve put a lot of work into it.”

“Uh, thank you? We’ll be leaving now.”

“Okay, okay, I’m probably talking your ears off. Enjoy yourselves!”

As we walked over to the road, I mulled over what she had talked about. Cars? Chicago? Conventions? Comic-Con? Where  _ were _ we?


	3. What is this place?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alushtas and Robin wind up on Earth - this is where a new character is gained!  
> i dont know how to write summaries sorry

**7**

We started to walk down the road. The sun beat down, burning us up, and strange machines whizzed by us at frightening speeds. Considering what the woman had told us, I assumed these were  _ cars _ , which terrified me for what might happen should they break down at those speeds. Robin tried to make conversation, but I wasn’t in the mood for it.

After about an hour, we were both exhausted, though, in the distance, we saw buildings towering up into the sky, which I assumed was the city. Half an hour later, we were dragging ourselves up the road, and the city was laid out in front of us. It was terrifying, because wherever we were, the sky was blocked off mostly by the giant buildings, which looked like they were scraping the top of the world. We collapsed beneath one, and Robin almost immediately fell asleep. I, still watchful and cautious of a new place, sat in the lotus position and meditated.

When I was finished, about 4 hours later, I decided to leave. I set up some defenses, though one of my charms didn’t seem to be working properly, which was strange. As I walked through the city, I was glad to know that I could read all of the signs and such around it. It seemed to be in Common, though it possibly had an enchantment to let anyone read it in their main language. There were many strange and disturbing things, and the ‘cars’ seemed to take over most of the walking space. Many people stared at me, but I am used to that, especially because of my hair. I pulled my hood up to cover it, but they continued to look. I was getting pretty annoyed by that point, and so I moved into a building. It seemed to be some kind of clothing store, though not with any kind of armor or protection in general as something important. The main deciding factor in what people were buying seemed to be the design, which seemed inane and unimportant to me, but whatever.

I decided that I needed some new clothes so that I could fit in wherever we were, but I wasn’t willing to give up what I was already wearing. I decided to get a large blue sweater to wear over my clothing, with a hood so that I could cover my hair (and ears, for it didn’t seem like anyone else here was an elf). I decided to get some ‘sweatpants’, simply because they seemed to cover my legs the best while also allowing me to move. I brought them to the counter, where I tried to pay with a couple silver coins, the price I would gauge for the items, though apparently wherever we were used small, green slips of paper as currency. Somehow, I managed to get the clothes honestly, and get out of there. I had to find a place for my bow, which I simply ended up leaving behind near where Robin was, and I had to enchant the appearance of the staff so it didn’t look like it had the spider on it. Other than that, with the clothes I got (I forgot to get any for Robin, though he blended in a little better), I think I fit in enough to not draw too many looks.

When I returned to Robin, he was awake and standing. He looked a little upset, which I suppose he was entitled to considering I had left him alone here.

“So, where are we? Did you find that out when you left me here?” he asked, annoyed.

“Yes, I believe we are in the ‘Chicago’ the woman told us about, and the people here use green slips of paper for currency. Everyone speaks Common, so you don’t have to worry about that, though I only saw humans, not any dwarfs, elves, or even halflings.”

“Could be an entirely human settlement.”

“Maybe, but it seems too large for that. Also, the clothing store I went to didn’t have any armor or defenses at all, only thin fabric like this. In addition to that, some of my charms didn’t work. One of them almost blew up in my face, which  _ definitely _ isn’t normal.”

“Let’s ask around, see if we can find where we are. We should split up and meet back in, hm, an hour? Yeah, an hour.”

*

We went in different directions, him down one street, me down another. 

“Well, Alushtas,” I said under my breath to myself, “Where should you go to find out information?”

I looked around for a while, and saw some more stores that I decided I would not enter until I had the correct money to pay for items, as well as some residential buildings. Everything was extremely tall, even taller than the tavern we had stolen from weeks ago, and it all confused me quite a lot. Eventually, I found a pawn shop, which luckily didn’t look too different from the ones I had seen before, except for the neon signs and the human pawnbroker (most of the ones I knew were goblins or orcs, for whatever reason). I managed to trade some of my gold pieces for about $150, which seemed like a good amount. By this point, it had been half an hour, but I kept looking around. 

After about 5 minutes, I saw a large building, mercifully not nearly as tall as the others surrounding me, but still quite big. By this point, I had decided that either we were in a very far away part of the world, or we had shifted dimensions. I went inside, intent on finding a mage that could help transport us back to Faerûn, but when I got to the person at the desk, who seemed to be someone in charge, all she told me was, “Look, sir (which I did not appreciate), there are flights to San Diego, California, you might find a convention there. I don’t know much about them, but I’ve heard of wizards at conventions.” I thanked her, and booked two tickets to California.

I returned to our meeting location about five minutes before Robin arrived. I told him what I suspected about where we were, and that there were wizards in California that might be able to give us the assistance we needed. He told me that he didn’t find anything, though he also managed to get some money, as well as some food. It was similar to foods back home, but strangely different as well. 

We got to our flight a bit late, but managed to board, and it was  _ terrifying _ ! We were trapped in a metal tube, thousands of feet in the air, with nothing to do. It took about four and a half hours, and somehow Robin was able to relax. I hoped that I wouldn’t have to ride in such a monstrosity again, for I didn’t even like riding animals that flew, let alone mechanical beasts.

When we landed, I got as far away from the metal machine as quickly as possible, though I did collect the things I had in my luggage. I am not sure how we made it through security, as it seemed to have detectors of weapons, but I’m assuming Robin used some kind of magic to fool them. It was nearly night, so we looked around and found a place to spend the night. It was a motel, and didn’t cost too much, which was nice. We crashed into our beds, confident that the next day would bring us good fortune.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**8**

As an elf, I didn’t really sleep, I merely meditated. 4 hours of meditation for me is about the same as 8 hours of sleep for a human, I believe, and much more productive, for I can think, ponder, and contemplate as I desire while meditating, instead of being dead-brained or dreaming. I woke up much before Robin, and decided to explore again. I left him a note this time, and left the room.

The city was similar to Chicago, but definitely different as well. From what I saw, we were in luck, for the ‘Comic-con’ was going to be in about a week. I didn’t know exactly what a Comic-con was, but from what I’d been told, it definitely seemed like the sort of place where I’d find a wizard. Also, it quickly became clear that we had changed dimensions, and the only seemingly sentient creatures here were humans, with a lot of the other races I knew to exist living only in the pages of fantasy books and games. I found one roleplaying, tabletop game called Dungeons and Dragons, which had a lot of information about a lot of things that I knew about, including my own species. A large world that was a part of D&D, as it was called, was even called Faerûn, which freaked me out. After some thinking, I decided that someone had been to this universe, and created a game based off of our world, giving me hope that they may be able to help us escape.

When I returned, I found Robin eating breakfast. He didn’t seem angry that I had left, especially when I told him what I knew.

“Well, it’s a stretch,” he said, “but I think if an actual wizard was here, they would be at this Comic-con. I found some information, and apparently a lot of people dress up, or cosplay, as different fictional people or species, including, surprisingly, elves. Probably the only place in this realm that you can be uncovered without attracting attention.”

I laughed, and responded, “I think I’ll still attract attention, if just because my elf cosplay is so good.”

“Fair enough.”

*

We spent the week learning more about ‘Earth’, which is an interesting place. It seemed that magic did not naturally occur here, but could exist. It was what is known as a Chaos realm, where both technology and magic both exist, though magic did not always work correctly because it isn’t natural there. However, possibly because they were designed to go between dimensions, my Vorpal blades worked perfectly, which was wonderful in a world that, while being much more violent than most, absolutely did  _ not _ tolerate using such blades.

The day before we went to Comic-Con, I believe it was a Wednesday, we really didn’t have anything to do. I was sick of learning about Earth, and Robin had learned as much as he needed to, which was good enough for him.

“So,” he said, walking up to me. I was leaning against a wall of the breakfast area of the motel, eating a bagel with cream cheese. “We have gotten to know each other, and grown, I think at least, to be friends. However, I don’t know anything about your past. All I know is that you are a thief, and a good conversationalist. Tell me about yourself.”

I took a deep breath, and thought for a minute. “Okay, do you want me to start all the way back at the beginning?”

“Yeah, I think that would be a good place to begin,” he said after a moment’s consideration.

“Okay, then. Let’s see… My birth was special, for most elves  _ are _ born male or female. I, however, was born completely androgynous, with neither sexes’ genitals or anything, in the image of one of the elven gods, Corellon Larethian. At least in my culture, anyone can be anything, and gender doesn’t hold anyone back, though we androgynes are special. Because of our androgyny, we don’t experience puberty like other elves. It is difficult to explain, but the point is, we don’t experience sexual attraction or the normal mood swings or whatever of being a teenager. We cannot be seduced because of this, though I suppose we could be seduced romantically, because we can still feel romantic love. We typically become warriors or something like that, and I later chose to be a thief, because it’s fun.

“In addition to that, I also have my hair. It evidently changes color depending on my mood, which can make it difficult to hide my emotions, though it  _ has _ helped me become more in tune with them than I believe others are. I do not know  _ why _ it changes colors, though I have tried to find out in my past.

“I lived in elven woods, for, yes, I am a wood elf, and my woods were fairly safe, and there were some more wild woods next to ours. I believe there were animals there that we didn’t feel comfortable dealing with, and our woods were plentiful enough, and so we were content to stay where we were. There was a halfling settlement in our forest, not too far from the wild woods, and I spent a lot of time there. Some elves lived as caretakers for the young halflings, and one of those halflings was my best friend, a young boy named Tyr. We got into a lot of mischief, which probably got me on the path to be a thief and a rogue. He was a lot of fun, though, one day, when he was a teenager, he wanted to go with his sister and caretaker to explore some ruins he heard about in the wild woods. I advised him not to, as there was a reason we didn’t go there, but he didn’t listen to me. He got his stuff together, prepped himself for the mission, and left. I never saw him again.”

“That’s terrible,” Robin said sympathetically.

“Yeah. He told me he would be back in 2 weeks, but after a month, I was disparaged. After it had been 2 months, I felt incredibly guilty. I felt that if I had gone with him, I could’ve protected him. I left home, for it held too many memories of him, and went out into the world.

“I traveled around a bit, ended up in Ten-Towns, and stayed for a bit. Eventually, I moved on, and moved around more. Finally, I ended up in Calimport, where I became a thief. You heard about my first job, and then I just kind of made my way around until I found my way here. That’s about it for me, I think. What about you?”

Robin sighed. “My story really isn’t that exciting. Still, I guess I can’t dissuade you. I lived with my parents until I was 16, when I was kicked out for being aromantic and asexual. Humans are, unfortunately, much less accepting than other races. Anyway, similar to you, I kinda just went around, being a street rat, stealing what I needed. Eventually, I managed to pull off such a big stunt that, of course, my current guild found and recruited me, just as I recruited you.”

“That is certainly shorter than my backstory, though just as important. I’m sorry about your parents.”

He shrugged, and said, “Eh, yeah, I’ve gotten used to it. It hurt at first, but by now I haven’t talked to them at all, and I’ve understood that not everybody is accepting, and that is something that needs to be changed.”

“I didn’t know you were ace aro, why haven’t you told me?” I asked, cocking my head to one side.

“Didn’t feel the need to, I guess. I don’t know,” he responded sheepishly.

“That’s fair. Anyway, what do you want to do today? We’ve stood here for about half an hour, we still have like 10 hours or something about math and time.”

“Uh, I don’t know, there’s a park somewhere around here called SeaWorld, wanna go?”

I considered for a moment, and then replied, “Sure, as long as we can get in”

We went over to SeaWorld, where we luckily had enough to pay the entrance fee. To write, it wasn’t very exciting, though Robin did try to free the otters: “ _ They’re just too cute to stay here! We have to help them! _ ”. We rode the few rides there were, and in the end, I didn’t really enjoy the trip, because we both felt bad for the animals. When we got back, we reviewed our game plan for Comic-Con.

“So, we’re going to go as ourselves, because lots of people will be like that,” Robin said. “Your ‘costume’ is the best of anyone’s around, obviously, and so you will probably draw a crowd. Do your thing, use those blades, dazzle them. I’ll be looking for anyone that looks like they are  _ too _ interested in what you’re doing, and approach them. I know what I’m going to say, though I will definitely end up improvising. I’m sure we’ll find someone that can help us.”

“Sounds good, and I’m hopeful we can get back soon,” I replied.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**9**

The next morning, we were both excited. We were finally going to get our answers. Fairly early that morning, we set out. It took us a bit to find the convention center, which Robin remarked upon: “ _ This sounds exactly like the sort of thing we should’ve prepared for earlier this week _ ”. I hate it when he’s right.

When we got there, we were awestruck at the spectacle before us. Hundreds of people, dressed as wizards, elves, orcs, comic book superheroes, video game characters, and soooooooo much more were there. Cosplayers of every kind, colors everywhere, it was incredible! I can’t begin to describe the wonder I felt, or everything I wondered at.

“All the hype was worth it,” Robin whispered to me, and I slowly nodded.

“This is… wow,” I responded, my eyes large. The twos of us, Robin and I, walked into the center, and my jaw dropped. It was even  _ better _ than the outside! So many people, packed into the place! I knew it was big, but now I was wondering how exactly I was supposed to entertain  _ everybody _ while Robin looked through them.

“Okay, slight change to the plan. I’m going to go up on that stage and begin my act. I’ll invite some people up, do some cool stuff. I’ll use a spell to broadcast my voice, for I think it’d be difficult to get a connected microphone headpiece thing. You get up there-” I pointed up to some of the pathways near the ceiling, probably so that those large posters on the wall could be hung, or something “- and use this charm of seeing” -I produced a small magnifying glass from my pocket - obviously enchanted, not just a magnifying glass “-and scan the crowd. You know what to look for, and, I don’t know, figure out a way to contact them. Maybe you have a charm, or something, I’m not sure. Improvise, you’re good at that!”

“This is a terrible idea,” Robin told me, “and you’re going to get kicked out. Still, I can’t think of a better idea.”

I grinned. “Good, and besides, if I do well enough, they won’t want me to leave. Now go up, and get ready.”

I waited while he made his way through back ways and such, until he was up on the pathways (I should really figure out what they are called, but we don’t have them where I come from, and I don’t feel like learning it). He tossed something down at me, not sure how it got to me through the crowd, and I looked questioningly at him. He mimed putting it in my ear, and it  _ did _ look like some kind of earpiece. I gently placed it in my ear, wincing slightly, for I didn’t think it was meant for my pointy elven ears. 

“Hey,” a voice that sounded like Robin’s came into my ear. I jumped, and looked up at him. He was grinning, of course.

“Can we communicate through these?” I hesitantly asked, to which I heard, while noticing it was definitely Robin speaking, “Yeah, I found a couple earpieces and tuned them to each other. Don’t know how I managed, but hey, if it ain't broke, don’t knock it.”

I chuckled, and responded, “Fair. Let’s get this show on the proverbial road and the literal stage.”

I pushed my way through the crowd, passing Captain Americas, Captain Rogers’, Captain Mal Reynolds’, and many others that were not Captains. Finally, I made my way to the stage. Wondering what exactly I would say, I jumped up onto it, where there were luckily no people, and muttered to myself, “I’m an introvert, and yet I’m here at such an extrovert place, about to do something terrifying. It’s a good thing I really want to get home, and I really hope this works.”

I activated my charm as people looked up at me, wondering what an elf was doing up on stage, and began speaking.

“Hello, all of you. You might be wondering what I’m doing up here on stage. To be honest, I am not sure either, but I think I’m supposed to give a demonstration or whatever it’s called for my cosplay, but they didn’t really tell me. Hey, can I get some boxes or something destructible up here?”

A couple confused convention workers brought up some empty boxes, while I sweated, wondering if I should make a run for it. Somehow, though, nobody came up and stopped me. I wasn’t even sure why there was a stage up here in the first place. Was an event or actual demonstration supposed to happen? Whatever the case, this was working, and I could see Robin up there scanning the crowd, though none of them really should be interested yet.

It was time to change that.

I deftly pulled out my sword, keeping it in this dimension. I did some basic fighter’s moves, which seemed to impress the people. 

“This is one of two Vorpal blades of mine. The name is misleading, or rather, does not do my blades justice. A vorpal blade simply is one that has the capacity to decapitate a foe, especially in fantasy games such as Dungeons and Dragons. However, all of my blades are like that.”

A few nervous laughs floated to me. I looked up at Robin for support, and he gave me a thumbs up. He spoke to me, saying, “Now, tell them the special thing and give them a little demonstration.”

“Okay. My blades are special, for they are enchanted. They can change dimensions at my will, and thus pass through objects in this one when I desire, and join back up in this one to cut what I want.”

To demonstrate, I deftly stabbed my sword at the first box, phasing it just before it broke the flimsy cardboard.

“Now, that may not look impressive, as you do not know that my blades do any damage at all, or that these boxes were not staged so I would not appear to do any damage. Furthermore, optical illusions could render it such that I did not stab the cardboard at all, and thus am a fraud. Now, will someone please come up here? I really don’t care who.”

People murmured amongst themselves, until one person stepped forward.

“I will,” they said, and I asked them a little about themselves. They were John, a human male, who came alone, dressed as The Arrow from DC. He loved coming to Comic-Con, and was excited at the opportunity to be a part of what he thought of as a very real and planned demonstration. He came up on stage, and I appraised him.

“I loved your T.V. show,” I said, saying the first thing that popped into my head. I had never seen a single episode, but knew that it was a thing and hoped he wouldn’t question me.

He beamed at me, and said, “Thank you! You are a really good elf!”

“I try. Now,” I directed this at the crowd, “I shall prove, in front of a witness, that these blades are no joke.”

I quickly pulled the handles close to myself, phased them back into reality, and drove them into the boxes. They easily cut through them, for they were designed to cut through things  _ much _ tougher than some boxes. I then rapidly whirled, phased my blades out of sync, swept the handles just in front of John’s face, and phased them back in sync with the world. I asked a stunned, slightly scared John to touch the blades, and he reported they were very sharp.

“Now, was  _ that _ an optical illusion? I think not. I am also a great fighter, and master of small charms.” At this, I tossed up a charm I had created haphazardly and quickly earlier, which exploded into a sunburst of light. I had built it to be merely light and not also heat, a better model, I think, than the fireworks of Earth. I pulled another from my cloak, threw it to the ground, and watched as the image of a unicorn burst from it, dazzling the crowd as it dashed between them, an apparition and nothing more. After lapping the center, it returned to the charm, which I picked up. I asked John to return, and I thought about what I would do next.

I heard Robin tell me, “I may have found someone. Here, let me give you some sight.” Before I could protest, I was looking through one of Robin’s eyes and one of my own, which was quite disconcerting. I closed the eye connected to my own vision, and looked through Robin’s. He was looking at a wizard, quite a well done cosplay, perhaps  _ too _ well done. He was staring attentively at me, but not the same way as the others. He wasn’t awed, or surprised, just kinda wide-eyed, like he couldn’t believe someone else was here. I nodded, prepared for vertigo, and opened my other eye.

After a moment, I noticed the position of the wizard. I noted him in my mind, noted where he was, and whispered to Robin to disconnect us. My vision was yanked back to my own perspective, which was nice, and I prepared my next bit. Everyone was still oohing and aahing at my magic, and so I decided to have a little fun. 

“You there!” my voice boomed, my finger pointed at the wizard. He panicked, and I quickly said, “No, please, come on up. I won’t hurt you, I just want another person for my next part. John was lovely, but  _ you _ look like you know some  _ real _ magic!” I laughed, and the audience laughed as well. He was pushed forward, and reluctantly got up on stage. 

“Now, what is your name?” I asked him, which was the polite way to go about things, I believed.

He glared at me, and responded, “I am Thuzhal, a wizard banished to this realm for many heinous acts.”

“Ooh, nice backstory. I like it! What kinds of acts?” I replied enthusiastically.

He sighed, and said, “Well, people don’t really ask me, so I  _ say _ they’re heinous. I was just kinda messing around and  _ apparently _ broke something important, and so I was magically exiled. I was trying to figure out how to get back in, looking through probably forbidden texts, when I tried a spell to return me to the place so I could undo my exile, but it instead sent me across dimensions and I ended up on this technology-ridden, climate-changed planet.”

I clapped, and people in the audience followed my example. “I like that! Gives you an objective, something dark, and just enough flare of mystery. Now, my good sir, I am also not from around here. I was transported here when I tried to figure out the true magical nature of my staff, here-” I gestured at the staff I had leaned against a wall, yes, obviously the one topped with the spider, “-and found myself in a cornfield in Illinois! Naturally, I was confused, as corn does not exist in my world, and I did not know that I had changed dimensions. Now, my man, I believe we can help each other! You know magic and magical items, and I have my staff! Now, for my demonstration…” I decided to try a little something. I pulled out my blades, and concentrated on making them visible, but slightly out of sync with Earth. The sword blades usually became invisible when phased, but I did my best to keep that from happening. 

The blades flickered, trying to change dimensions, but I did my best. Eventually, they came into full view, but I passed them gently through my hand to make sure they weren’t physical. I then whirled and, similarly to what I did with John, tried to swing it through the wizard’s neck. However, he was also armed, and so tried to block my attack, which obviously failed. My blade passed straight through him, and he retaliated, swinging a small dagger at me with ferocity and a wild look in his eyes. From the way he handled his blade, I could tell he wasn’t experienced.  _ This was going to end quickly, luckily _ , I thought, and parried his frenzied swing. 

With a series of quick swipes, jabs, kicks, and punches, I disarmed the wizard and sent him to his knees. “Look, man, I didn’t want this to happen. I’m sorry for swinging at you, but it was part of the demonstration. You can get up and help me, or leave, alone, stuck here, probably never to return to your home. Which would you prefer?”

Thuzhal considered my words, and grudgingly got to his feet. I handed him his dagger, which appeared to be made of mithril, and smiled. 

“Good, now let’s get out of here. I’m not even supposed to be demonstrating anything here, I just got up on stage and nobody stopped me for whatever reason.” I deactivated my microphone-like charm, and told Robin, “Come on, let’s go.”

He ran into a door, and quickly joined me. I surveyed the crowd, which was full of whispers, no doubt about me and what I had just said. I jumped down, followed by Thuzhal and Robin, and we pushed past the crowd, out of the door, and ran a block before slowing to a walk. We returned to our motel, and I was happy we had managed to complete our goal for that day.

  
  
  
  
  
  


**10**

“I’m afraid we  _ may _ have a problem,” Thuzhal said, walking into the bedroom.

“What  _ kind _ of problem?” I asked, a little surprised by his sudden entrance and a little frustrated that he couldn’t immediately solve all of our problems.

He winced at the strength of my words, and responded, “Well, I know what kind of magic it uses, and I can partially control it. However, I cannot control the exact dimension. I can make it so that we don’t end up places we can’t survive, like in the vastness of space, or on a planet where the air is poisonous. We will have to travel many worlds until we either get lucky and end up in the right one, or find someone who can use your energy signatures to lock onto our universe. Will that work?”

I thought about it, looked over at Robin, who was sitting cross-legged on his bed, and looked back at Thuzhal. “Well, I guess we don’t really have a choice, so let’s go with that. Do we have  _ any _ idea how long this will take?”

Thuzhal grinned, and said loudly, “Nope!”

I sighed, and replied, “Well, pack your bags. Might as well get right on down to it.”

*

We packed the gear we wanted to bring with us, which included some probably illegal items. It has been neglected to mention that these items included two assault rifles,  _ lots _ of ammo, a couple grenades, a few other guns, including a sniper rifle and a pistol (of course we also had plenty of those ammos as well, and I intended to get a blacksmith or something to break them open and figure out how to make them and potentially augment them/the gun.). There were others, but I shouldn’t really mention them.

We gathered behind the motel, in the parking lot, after checking out and getting our stuff all ready. I readied myself for what was about to happen, planted the staff at arm’s length in front of me, and Robin and Thuzhal both grabbed it. After exchanging grim looks with both of them, I grabbed the spider, and it did the same thing as the previous time we used it, though the eyes seemed to glow brighter and the wind seemed stronger. I closed my eyes, and wondered what would happen on the other side, just before I lost consciousness.


	4. What are these dimensions?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They are going through different dimensions, causing some chaos, trying to get home or find someone who can help them.

**11**

When I returned to consciousness, I was confused. The sky was a pastel purple, with red dots swirling through it. It seemed like some kind of strange dream, and its colors were chaos. The ground was some kind of acid green, and there were portable toilets  _ everywhere _ . They were in every shade, from green to blue to pink to yellow. I closed my eyes, as I felt a migraine coming on. I shaded my eyes and reopened them, looking at the ground for Robin and Thuzhal. I found Thuzhal covering his eyes, peeking through his fingers at the landscape, and Robin was still passed out on the ground. Oh, and, by the way, Thuzhal is a human. 

“This is a strange world you have brought us to, elf,” he told me, and I followed his gaze. I had originally thought that the toilets were just sitting there, but as I really looked at them, I saw that they were moving. There was even a small village, made of  _ what _ I couldn’t say, as there wasn’t a tree or rock around. Even the ground itself was a deep green, and made of a substance I couldn’t make out. It was smooth, and I could push my hand through it, like a partial liquid. It was strange, as none of us were sinking into it, but it didn’t seem like good building material. The toilets weren’t walking, or splitting apart in any way, but just seemed to glide, all of which seemed very strange and impossible to me. When they came to a step, they seemed like they just jumped, but with no downward movement to create thrust upward, if that makes sense.

“Let’s… explore?” I said hesitantly, and Thuzhal strode toward the settlement. I followed him, after a moment’s consideration, and dragged Robin behind me. When we got closer, we could see that it was made of some kind of wood, and so I guessed that they had just taken down any trees in view. It seemed similar to a Wild West town, minus the dust everywhere, horses, natural colors, or people. I was quite unnerved, and moved close to one of the johns.

“Uh… hello?” I said (asked?) hesitantly. It’s door turned to me, and it seemed to make an annoyed, squishy sound from within it. 

“Do you guys have any wizards or magic folk at all?” I asked it. It moved toward me, making angry sounds from within it, and I backed away. “I don’t think it likes the sound of ‘wizard’.” It moved faster, squishing louder, and other toilets started coming over. I pulled Robin into a fireman’s carry on my back, and readied one of my blades. 

“We should get out of here, Thuzhal,” I told him, and he nodded, his eyes frantic. I turned and ran, but there were toilets everywhere.

“No time! We have to do it here!” I shouted, and he grabbed the staff. I shrugged Robin forward and held his hand around the pole, and grabbed the arachnid on top.

*

When I awoke, I simply lay there. I didn’t really want to open my eyes and find out where we had landed, but I suppose it would have to happen eventually. I slowly opened my eyes, and squinted at the bright light coming from the sun… suns? There were two shining orbs in the sky, one more yellow-y, and one more orange-y. It was very hot, and the ground was grainy. When I looked at the landscape, I saw that we were in a large desert of sand, and there were a couple houses in the distance. It looked like about midday, but I couldn’t be sure how long the day lasted, so it would be best to start moving. I got to my feet, and noticed that both Thuzhal and Robin were still passed out.

“Hey,” I said, shaking Robin. He stirred, and started moving. I moved over to Thuzhal, and patted his shoulder.

“Wakey, wakey, time to get up sleepyhead,” I told Thuzhal, and his eyes snapped open, then quickly shut.

“Where are we, and why is it so  _ bright _ ?” Thuzhal said, and Robin nodded in agreement.

I shrugged. “I’m not sure, but there are some houses over there, we can ask them. I hope it goes better this time than last time.”

Robin looked confused. He held up a finger, and said, “Last time? Do you mean Earth?”

I was also confused for a second, before I remembered that Robin had been asleep the previous dimension.

“Well, we travelled dimensions, and you know how we always fall unconscious when we do that? Well, you were asleep while Thuzhal and I almost died from sentient Porta-Potties.”

This only served to bewilder him even more, and I described the events that had taken place in the strange, colorful dimension.

“Anyway,” I said, finishing up, “we should get moving. We aren’t going to kill ourselves, after all!”

With that lovely remark, we started walking toward the houses. It was extremely hot, hotter than Calimport, even hotter than California in summer. I didn’t know how people handled it, but then I thought, perhaps the people here are different and more adapted to this environment. 

After probably 15 minutes, we got to the houses. They were strange, quite small and kinda dome-like, circular, with person-height walls and a sloped, domed kinda roof. It was similarly colored as the sand, probably so that it could blend in, though the satellite dish looking thing on top of it kinda ruined the effect. It was silvery, and very much did  _ not _ blend in.

“Sh-should we go in?” I asked tentatively, and Thuzhal marched forward, grinning. “Um, is that a yes?”

“I recognize this place!” he said in response, and knocked on the first door. I rushed toward him, but it was too late.

“HOW,  _ exactly _ can you recognize this? You’ve never been here! You were directly transported to-” A thought rushed into my mind, causing me to stop in my tracks. “It’s like Faerûn, huh? Someone came from this world, or travelled here, and made a story or whatever based on this place?”

He slowly nodded, and simply replied, “Star Wars.”

*

The door opened, sliding to one side, and a man came out. I hadn’t seen a lot about Star Wars, but there were a lot of cosplayers at Comic-Con that I had recognized as probably being from this universe. The person that opened the door looked like Obi-Wan, except his hair was black. I blinked, for, while it was true I didn’t know much about Star Wars (already mentioned, but it makes this sentence flow better. Shut up, stupid), I knew that: 1. He wasn’t supposed to be on Tatooine until much later, when he looked old with white hair, or something, and 2. His hair was brown, not black. All of this was very confusing, especially once Qui Gon Jinn walked past, asking, “Who is it, honey?”

“U… u-um, I’m Alushtas, and these are Robin and Thuzhal,” I stammered, my eyes searching for answers I doubted I would easily find.

“Ah, hello! What lovely and strange names! What can I do for you?” he asked nicely, and I looked at my companions. 

“Uh, can we come in? I think we need to talk to you,” I said kinda randomly, for I was still very confused and needed to figure out what was happening.

He smiled, and ushered us in. “Honey, come meet our guests!” he said, and Qui Gon walked back in.

I looked back and forth between the two men, and I asked Obi-Wan, “Why does he keep calling you ‘honey’?”

They looked at each other and smiled, and Obi-Wan told me, “Well, we were dating for a while, but then this  _ wonderful _ man approached me, what, probably almost a year and a half ago, and proposed to me! Of course, I said yes, and we’ve been living here ever since, happier than ever!” Qui Gon came over and hugged Obi-Wan deeply, and the two men sat down on a couch, holding hands. 

Thuzhal looked confused as well, though I had realized that this was not the normal Star Wars universe I knew, and the wizard asked, “Where is Luke? I thought he lived here.”

“Well, yes, he has, but once he married  _ his _ spouse, they’ve been travelling the galaxy. Would you like some blue milk?”

“Uh, sure,” I said, and Obi-Wan waved his hand. A glass came over to me, as if by magic, and I sipped it warily. It was good, similar to Earth milk, but more coconut-y. 

“Soooo, who has Luke married, anyway?” I asked Qui Gon, taking a longer drink from my glass.

“Oh, he ran off with that hooligan, Han Solo, for a bit, but he came back eventually, and told me they were getting married. I was shocked, for it seemed sudden, but they were happy, and so we gave them our blessing,” he replied, and I, suddenly realizing something, asked  _ another _ question (we really wanted to ask questions, I guess), “So what happened to Chewbacca?”

“Ah, good old Chew. They are going around the galaxy, exploring, happy by themselves. They liked Han, but they always felt  _ less _ , you know? They are very introverted, and just like to explore. They find people difficult to understand, and they’ve told me that everyone just goes too quickly for them. Last I heard, they were going to Coruscant, which is nice.”

“Mhm. Anyway, you guys haven’t mastered inter-dimensional travel yet, have you?” I asked, realizing that, while cool, this place wasn’t really gonna help us.

“Unfortunately, that project was shut down because of its possible repercussions and side effects and all that,” he told me, “did you need something like that?”

I shrugged, and said, “Yeah, it would’ve been nice, but I think we might be able to manage. We should be going, though. Thank you, both of you, for everything.”

Qui Gon smiled at us, and asked, “Are you sure you want to leave? We’d be happy for you to stay.”

I sadly smiled back at him, and replied, “Yeah, we need to go.”

We said our goodbyes, and left. When we were out of sight of the house, it was probably about midnight.

“Well guys? Shall we?” I said, holding out the spider-adorned staff.

  
  


*

We travelled through many more dimensions, probably more than I could ever describe. As we travelled, and got used to dimension-hopping, we slept for less and less time, and eventually simply got tired, and then slightly dizzy.

Something that I have talked about, but not really explained, was that Earth was a Chaos realm. This means that both magic and technology work there, though there are other realms in which magic works and tech doesn’t, ones where tech works and magic doesn’t, and ones where neither work. However, this is a flawed perspective. It is one described by wizards of old in my world (yes, interdimensional travel isn’t completely unknown back home in Faerun), and their experiences in other realms. 

This is flawed for a couple reasons. It isn’t so simple as just ‘technology and magic, or one, or neither’. Magic can take many forms, and magic that works in one place doesn’t necessarily work in another. In the Star Wars-like world, there were Jedi that could manipulate objects using their mind and what they called the Force, which seems to be a type of magic. Meanwhile, my own magic could have been unstable or unusable, because it is a different world than mine. Similarly, magic could exist on Earth, though its inhabitants didn’t usually have it, leading to unpredictable results. I was lucky that only a couple of my charms failed or had issues, and not more of them. There were many other forms of magic, but to go into detail would take too long.

Technology is also a difficult  _ thing _ to pin down. It’s basically just the application of knowledge for practical purposes, and so almost anything creature-made could be said to be technology. Again, some technology could function in some places, but not in others. Some steampunk worlds, for instance, couldn’t ‘fathom’ the existence of further innovation, like cars or computers. Other worlds were stuck in the Stone Age, and in some, not even bird’s nests could be made. I am not sure what would happen if one tried to make a bird’s nest in that world, but I had decided not to find out.

As we went along in our journey, I collected items. I wanted mementos of our travels, and hey, they might be useful in the future. Unfortunately, I wasn’t always able to pick things up, whether because of being chased by the inhabitants of the world or something else (and if you’re wondering if I took something from the Star Wars world, yes, I palmed a handle-looking thing with a button from a counter). This led to some fights, some running, and some pain. Still, I wanted certain items, like I think one was called a “Babel fish”, which allowed me to understand others, no matter what language they spoke. 

Something that I realized was that no matter where we went, some items were still able to be used. I eventually figured out that it was because they were dimensional items, which transcended some of the ordinary rules of the realms. We started with two - the staff itself, which is a good thing, because otherwise we would’ve ended up stranded on a random world. The other was my Vorpal blades, which was nice, because I liked them. However, the realm we received the third (and fourth and fifth?) dimensional item(s) was very… strange…

*

We had come from a world of robots. There wasn’t a single human, elf, dog, orc, sentient species of any kind, or really any organic being that we found. Everything was automated, and seemed as though there had once been people, but then they had left, potentially leaving the robots there to keep things up until they returned. However, we realized that it was unlikely, if not impossible, that a machine could bring us home, rather than magic. Therefore, we left pretty quickly, though not before I got a small bracelet that had nanotech that could form a dagger in my hand in a millisecond, which could be  _ quite _ useful.

When we arrived in the new realm, we found ourselves in a smallish room. There was a bed of flowers, yellow flowers, illuminated by a fairly dim light coming through a hole in the ceiling of the room. Actually, it seemed more like a cave, though we couldn’t really be completely sure. There was a hallway, or corridor, or whatever to our right. We went through it, and found a doorway.

We went through it, and walked through a system of rooms, some of which had puzzles, and traps, though none of them actually hurt us (well, except for Robin, who got a sprained ankle after falling through some leaves). We saw beings, some might call them monsters or abominations, which had very strange physical makeups. This wasn’t really uncommon for us to see, because of everywhere we had already been, but weird stuff is weird. One had a large eye as most of its body, and another looked similar to a frog. They ran from us, so we didn’t have to worry about fighting them, and when we got to the end of the rooms, we came to a small house.

We tentatively opened the door, and found the house deserted (or at least visibly so, and nobody came to the door to see who was there). There were stairs leading down to what I assumed was a basement right in front of us, a living room looking area to our left, and a hallway to our right. It seemed like an odd way to set up a house, but again, lots of places were quite queer (in both senses of the term). 

Anyway, we entered the living room. There was a table with chairs, bookshelves with books on them - “How to Cook Snails, Snail Basics, Meals with Snails?” -, and an armchair in front of a fireplace, fire included, which seemed like a fire hazard, but whatever. We didn’t find anyone, so we went through the door leading out of the room (not the one we entered).

We were in a kitchen, which seemed normal, except the stove didn’t work, there was white fur in the sink, and a pie on the counter. There was a faint smell of pie crust and cinnamon in the air, and I took a slice for later, in case I might want it (hey, I’m a thief, what would you expect, perfect morals?). We went back to the first room, and entered the hall.

There were three doors, two of which were bedrooms. We decided not to explore them, though one looked more like a child’s bedroom and one like an adult’s. The third was locked, however, and had a sign that read, ‘Room under Renovations’. Because there was no more of the house to explore, we went down the stairs to the basement.

There wasn’t really an actual basement, as far as we could tell. It was a long hallway, which, after walking the entirety of, showed us a doorway, similar to the one at the entrance, which we went through, as we didn’t want to walk back. We found ourselves in some kind of snowy, forest-y area, though, when we looked up to the sky, we could faintly see a cavern roof.

I’ll spare you the details, but basically, we went through this region, a very wet, cave-like region, and a  _ very _ hot area. In the hot area, we came across a laboratory, which we chose to go into. It had a large video screen, seemingly inactive, though I couldn’t tell its use. As we continued walking through the building, we saw a cluttered desk, a bag of dog food(?), and a dark hole in the wall. When we got to the hole, the door to a bathroom hitherto unseen opened, and a tall lizard woman (?) came out. She looked quite surprised to see us, but hurried over nonetheless. 

“More humans? This is quite unusual… umm… hello? Who are you?” she asked hesitantly.

“I am Alushtas, and I am not a human… which I only tell you because I don’t know why. I am an elf, This is Robin, he’s a human, and Thuzhal, whose race I never actually found out, I think,” I responded.

“And I would prefer to keep it that way,” Thuzhal said, smiling and extending his hand toward the person. “And you are…?”

“Oh!” She blushed furiously. “M-my name is A-alphys, and I’m the-the royal scientist for King Asgore.”

“Oh, that’s cool. Do you guys have any, you know…, magic?” I asked Alphys. We seemed to do a lot of questioning in these worlds, and not much else.

“K-kinda, we have magical a-attacks and the like, and fire magic, and probably other kinds.”

“Oh.” I must’ve looked really sad, because she immediately responded with, “B-but that’s okay! Here, I can improve your phones! You… don’t… have phones? Um, I can get you phones!”

She rushed upstairs up an escalator, then quickly came down another closer to the entrance. She was holding three small objects, which I assumed was a phone, and hoped her word for phone meant the same thing it meant for me, because it could be useful. It seemed that way, so yay.

“Here! I have a phone for each of you! Y-yes, I had them l-laying around… anyway, they can text, access the internet wherever, access special Dimensional Boxes, defuse bombs, and activate a jetpack! Here, t-take them!”

We each took a phone, and I immediately checked out the Dimensional Boxes. They each had space for 8 items, seemingly no matter the size, which didn’t make sense, but whatever. There were 3 boxes, which was nice, so I didn’t have to worry about 24 items taking up space in my Bag of Holding. 

“Sweet, thank you!” I said, and she blushed again. “Oh, don’t worry, I just like helping people! S-speaking of which, there was this human that came through a bit ago. Have y-you seen them? I think Toriel is coming after them, and I’m a b-bit worried.”

Thuzhal and I exchanged looks as Robin looked between us. “No, we haven’t seen anybody except a couple dudes back at that purple place,” I told her, and her eyes widened.

“O-oh! You n-need to go… I’m s-sorry I can’t help more! Now, g-get out of here!”

She pushed us out of a back door, while I protested and tried to ask her about dimensional travelling. She didn’t listen to me, and locked the door after us.

“Well, now what? Do we go after the human? Do we go see the king? Do we leave? What do you dudes think?” I asked, looking at Robin and Thuzhal, whose backs were to the lab. 

“I think I can help!” a cheery voice said from behind. I whirled around, dagger forming in my hand. A little yellow flower had popped up from the ground, and it had a face which was smiling at us.

“I’m sorry, who are you?” Thuzhal asked, suspicious of the small being.

“I’m Flowey! Flowey the flower! You were just talking to that overgrown lizard, huh? Don’t listen to her, she doesn’t know what she’s talking about!” the golden flower told us.

“Um, she seemed nice, while you were insulting her. Not really the way to play the ‘nice guy’ card,” Robin interjected.

Flowey gave a wide smile, and said, “Oh, sorry. We all insult her, ‘cause she’s senile and ignorant of the world. Even nice old King Asgore cracks jokes about her!”

By this point, I was very unsettled, but decided to humor Flowey. “So, you said you can help us. How?”

“Easy! The rules down here are simple. You k i l l, o r y o u b e k i l l e d.” As he spoke, his face grew ugly, into a mixture of a smile and a look of utter hatred. He sent little white bullets at us, which we tried to dodge, but some still hit us. They really hurt, and it felt like my life force itself was being sapped. I swung my dagger at him, but he popped back into the ground and back up a bit further on.

“Hope you guys have fun! See ya later!” he said, smiling, and vanished into the ground.

“That… was horrible,” I said, and both of my companions nodded. 

“We should leave and never return.” Again, they nodded.

I pulled out the staff from my Bag, held it out, and we did our thing. However, as we began to flicker out of the strange, underground world, none of us noticed the edge of a flower root curling around the base of the staff.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**12**

From there, we continued on our way, oblivious to our nefarious passenger. After that moment, I’m not sure where exactly he went, so let’s ignore him for now, eh?

We travelled more, were attacked, Thuzhal broke a leg, Robin scared a cat badly, almost starting an apocalypse… anyway! We picked up another passenger on another realm, though this one was like Thuzhal - a nice one, which would be invaluable later on!

The previous dimension wasn’t very exciting, and as such won’t be talked about. Only the finest highlights here! I remember something about big dogs, though, so that was nice. Anyway, back to the important one.

We arrived in some kind of stronghold. The room we were in was deserted, luckily, and there wasn’t a lot around. There were some unlocked cases that had ammo in it, which was nice, because my guns were running out of ammo. There were also a couple of… vending machines? Except, one of them dispensed different shields and healing items, and the other sold… ammo and grenades? What kind of world was this? There was some kind of human height machine, though we couldn’t ascertain its purpose. It was next to a small set of rickety stairs, which led up to the vending machines. A carpet led to the right, where a small building stood, and two entrances stood to each side of it. The building was more of a hut made of metal, and didn’t seem to serve any actual purpose.

Now that the description is out of the way - wait! To be clear, we were in a building, and the roof was not far from our heads, and pretty much everything was metal. It’s difficult to describe, as that’s not really my strong suit, but I do my best. I’m alluding to what this place ended up being, because it does exist on Earth to some extent, and so maybe you’ll figure it out. Think of it like a puzzle, or a mystery. If you fail, either you didn’t know the game (whoops, I said it was a game! There’s another hint!), or I’m terrible at explanations, or you didn’t know the specific place. Maybe you’ll realize later what I’m talking about. Maybe not. By this point, I’m not sure I really care. Anyway!

We walked through the door, and immediately were fired upon. There were bandits everywhere, and they were shooting at us. We ducked behind some metal thingys sticking up from the ground, which shouldn’t have stopped bullets, but the improbable had decided to visit us today. 

“What kinda world is this, where we don’t even get to introduce ourselves before people hate us?” Robin shouted at me.

“I know, right? At least hate us for who we are, not just because we exist. However, the fact that we simply appeared in their encampment might have to do with it.” I replied, pulling out my assault rifle from my bag.

“Don’t do anything stupid!” Thuzhal warned me, and I smirked at him.

“When have I ever done anything stupid?” I said, and peeked out from my hiding place. They just kept firing, not caring about hiding behind barriers (That was the word! I guess it isn’t perfect, but words never are). I was peeking through a small hole in the thing, and pushed the barrel of my gun through another hole in it. I aimed carefully, adjusted for the simple fact that my eye was further from the barrel than normal, and started firing. Some of them ducked behind cover, though some just stood around, and there was a  _ big _ one with a body shield that didn’t need something so trivial as  _ cover _ . 

My bullets didn’t seem to be harming them, however. I pulled the still-warm muzzle of the rifle out of the barrier, and told my companions: “My bullets don’t seem to be harming them!”

“Well then, try something else! Something magicky!” Robin yelled at me over the loud clamor of the guns. 

“We don’t know the rules of this place! It could go horribly, or not work, or work perfectly!” When I saw the look he was giving me, I conceded, “Of course, if they shoot us full of holes, it won’t matter whether or not we use magic. And, if it fails, maybe it’ll take them out, and not us!”

I pulled my bag of charms I had collected over in front of me, and sorted through them. I had one that summoned a lion, but there were a lot of guns, and I wasn’t sure any animal could survive long enough, plus I like animals. I found one that would explode, but I didn’t want to blow us up as well if I could avoid it. Finally, I found one that released gas that would immediately knock out anyone that inhaled, and worked through gas masks and stuff as well because magic. I readied it in my hand, glanced through the hole so I could aim, drew back my hand, and -

A humanoid figure quickly appeared at the entrance I had come through. They were slashing a sword through the air and pretty much staying in the same place, which seemed like a bad idea considering there were a lot of dudes with long range weapons. The bandits started shooting at this new and very much visible opponent, and bullets ripped through them. They didn’t flinch, and kept swinging their sword randomly, until they flickered, and disappeared. At the same time, a sword materialized in the back of the big, heavy dude with the shield, coming straight through his heart and out of the shield.

As the shield dude toppled to the floor, a person flickered into view. They looked the same as the one that used to be in the doorway, and I later realized it was a hologram, used as a deception for the actual fighter. The bandits looked toward them, confused, and the figure regarded them, then spoke:

“How are you doing? I need to kill you right now. It’s not personal.”

They suddenly flashed into action, a gun appearing in their hand. They jumped toward me with inhuman strength, turned toward the bandits, and started shooting at them. Their bullets were much more effective than mine, and quickly dispatched the bandits. One of the bandits managed to hit them, but the bullet hit a blue field that… just showed up? Like, there was nothing, then just as the bullet hit what was previously invisible, it flashed light blue.

“Um, hello? Thank you for saving us. Who are you?” I asked once all of the bandits were dead.

“My name is Zer0. I am searching for the Vault. And now, who are you?” said our mysterious savior.

“Well, I am Alushtas, this is Robin, and here is Thuzhal. We are trying to find our way back home, but so far ‘here’ doesn’t seem to help.”

“You need to find your. Way home? Might I be able. To help you in this?”

“Your words sound jilted and strange. Does that have a reason? I’m not trying to be insensitive, but I want to know,” I said, to which Zer0 started moving, agitated.

I should probably explain. Zer0 didn’t really appear  _ human _ , but perhaps like a human in a suit. The suit was blue and black, with a belt, and down the legs there was a bag for holding, probably, ammo, and something was strapped to the calf, with a brace, or pad, or something on it. They had a smooth faceplate, and the head overall looked like mostly glass and metal. On their elbows, they had some kind of a spike, and they had 4 fingers (Eh, by this point it’s pretty obvious I’m bad with description. Go look up Zer0 using that computer or phone you’re using. From Borderlands 2). On their face played emotes, in this case a question mark.

“I can only speak. In haiku, I am not sure why. Part of my being?”

“Anyway, you said you might be able to help us? What do you mean?”

“There are things out there. That you will need help killing. I’m bored, something new.”

“Um, okay… we won’t be staying here unless you guys have inter-dimensional travel… are you sure?”

“Yes, I am quite sure. I thought it over quickly. I don’t want to stay.

“The search for the vaults. Is fruitless, and as such I. Shall move on elsewhere,” he finished, in his strange, haiku way.

“Are you sure? I think I’ve played this game, and you end up finding the vault.”

“Fine, I just want to. Avoid this fate, which I have en-. -dured too much before.

“This game has three modes. Regular, true, ultimate. I’ve done them too much.

“I am bored of it. The same thing over again. Won’t continue this.

“I will go with you. Help where I can with my skills. Have new adventure.”

I smiled at them, and replied, “That sounds good. We might even be able to help fix that haiku voice, and let you speak as you want. Anyway, I guess... you’ll be joining us? That sounds... good… Oh! Though it isn’t permanent, I have a charm that might help you communicate for a bit… “ I rifled through my bag, and withdrew a specific charm. “Here you go!” I said, as I handed it to them.

It seemed to kinda soak into their hand, and their faceplate displayed an exclamation mark.

“Ah! What… happened? That was weird. I can speak… normally now? Now that I can talk normally, I can explain myself. I have destroyed BNK3R, killed the Warrior, and taken Handsome Jack off the face of Pandora way too much. I am as powerful as I will get, and killing bandits only gets old. I want something new, not involving Vaults or psychopaths. This seems worthy.”

“Okay… then… I suppose we might as well go? Not much else to do here, from what you said.”

“Yes, let’s.”

We did our thing with the staff, and left what Zer0 later told me was called Bloodshot Stronghold. What a place.

*

From there, we continued our journey, and, while each of these dimensions is important, it must be annoying to read, like “oh come on! Either say all of them or write barely anything!” Eh, whatever, I’m writing it how I want. 

There are some ideas I want to make clear, like how there are infinite dimensions and therefore parallel dimensions definitely exist (hence the Star Wars-parallel universe), some important things happen there (Undertale and Borderlands), and, though humanity knows about quite a few, there are still  _ millions _ of dimensions they have not the knowledge of (sentient toilet (?) world). 

Perhaps in the future, I shall explain about some of the other worlds we visited, but not right now. As before, we continued our exploration, taking stuff we wanted, though somehow it took a long time before we actually found someone that could help us. I’m going to skip to that, because I don’t have much more time to write.


	5. Aexriel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The quartet find themselves in a dystopian world ruled by a tyrant, and work to try to overthrow him

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WORK IN PROGRESS  
> ALSO ROUGH DRAFT

We emerged onto a busy street, which was similar to Earth’s, but… grayer? Everything was less colorful, more like shades of grey and such. We were in a residential area, with skyscrapers, so it seemed like a city. The street was filled with cars, and I’m giving a lot of description considering that as soon as we appeared, cars swerved and we immediately ran to the sidewalk. Anyway, yeah, everything was greyscale, cars filled the street, and people filled the sidewalk. Obviously, we were kinda out of place, and our sudden appearance was drawing attention.

People started to gather, and we ran down an alley, which, in retrospect, might’ve been a bad idea, though it ended well for us. Everyone was whispering, and Thuzhal was preparing a teleportation spell, until suddenly a manhole opened up! 

“Hey!” a voice from below said, and when I glanced down, I saw a pair of golden eyes peering back at me. “Down here, quickly!”

It seemed very  _ deux ex machina _ or whatever it’s called, but we didn’t have room to argue. However, I did have room to wonder how the person’s eyes were golden when everything else was grey, even us travellers who were in color everywhere else.

We jumped down the hole, though Thuzhal looked a little sad that he was again useless. The mystery person covered the manhole, and took us through the sewers, completing the trope that had been started when we went into that alley.

“So, uh, how are your eyes colored when everything else is in black and white?” I asked, never one to understate things.

The person glanced back at me, and replied, “I can explain when we’re safe,” which really made a lot of sense.

We continued through the pipes (could they be called pipes?), stopping only occasionally for our guide to check the way. I only call them sewers because they were big pipes in the ground, but they were completely empty of any sewage or water, and seemed like big cast iron tubes. 

Eventually, we came to a door, which was silvery and kinda looked like elevator doors. There was a keypad next to it, and our guide person typed in a code, which opened the doors, revealing a sitting room. The golden-eyed person sat down on the chair, one leg crossed over the other, while the four of us rested on the convenient couch across a coffee table from the chair. There wasn’t anything else in the room, other than another door on the opposite side from the one we entered through, which made me feel as though it was at least partially intentional that this was the room we entered (there was no way there were no other entrances to whatever other facilities lay down here).

“So…” I said, breaking the silence, “what’s your name?” Their head quickly turned toward me, and responded with a curt, “Call me Sam.”

“Okay… Sam, “Robin replied, “So why are your eyes golden while everything else around here is so… grey?” I reached past Thuzhal (I was sitting all the way on the left, then Thuzhal, Robin, and Zer0) and punched him on the arm.

“No, it’s okay,” Sam said, visibly relaxing, “though to answer that question, I would have to explain quite a bit.”

I looked at the others, and while I couldn’t see Zer0’s expression, they looked okay with it, or at least resigned to the fact that we should probably listen.

“Sure, go ahead, tell us,” I told them, and they gave a half-hearted smile. They looked thoughtful for a moment, then squinted one eye toward the ceiling as though realizing something that kinda went against what we were talking about.

“Actually, I should start somewhere else, and figure out how to explain everything else as I go,” Sam said.

“So, you’re probably wondering why I showed up at the perfect time. Well,-” he looked distant again, as though he was trying to gather his thoughts into something that would make sense “-um, there was a prophecy, or, well, erm… It’s not really a  _ prophecy _ , per se, but, um, kinda more like instructions? Or something? I’m not sure how to describe it, but let me explain more and maybe it’ll make more sense. So, uh, once, there was magic here, and it  _ flourished _ . Not everybody could use it, but everybody benefited from it. The community was strong, the government good, and the environment clear.

“But it was kinda chaotic. Don’t get me wrong, everybody was getting along and such, but because of how powerful the magic was, buildings were getting built immediately and destroyed quickly, and just overall it was pretty crazy. So one day, a mage decided to do something about it.” They shifted in their seat, switching the position of their legs.

“He built up his power, amassed a group of like-minded people, and led a coup. Because of his strength, he won easily, and set about getting rid of magic entirely. He massacred groups of people, mostly mages, and locked away all of the magical knowledge in a vault that only he could access. He was the only one allowed to use magic, and his mind-controlled minions saw to it that nobody else would even try. He even bleached the color from the world, so that it couldn’t serve as a reminder of the wonders of magic.

“That is why your sudden appearance was such a concern. Everybody had gotten used to the absence of magic that they were scared and wanted to gain favor with our dictator, and as such tried to capture you. There are a few of us that have gone into hiding and still know magic, and still have some color. We have a few non-magical people that act as our eyes and ears above the surface, who alerted us to your usage of magic.

“So, how’d I do?” They spread their arms, looking toward us. We exchanged looks again, as we do, and Thuzhal decided to take the initiative.

“That sucks, though what were you saying about a ‘prophecy’?”

They shifted again, looking uncomfortable, and responded, “Well, it’s more like this: We want to open up magic to the community again, and take down the leader, but we can’t do it as we are right now. The only magic we have is used to keep ourselves from being seen, and even that is fading over time. Therefore, we need a person, or people, that have enough power and can take down the government. Evidently, you guys have that power, and so we need your help.”

We looked shocked, and I understood why. We were just there to try to get home, not to get involved in a take-over. I explained this to Sam, and they looked thoughtful again.

“Actually, we might be able to help you, though not as much as you may think. I have heard of trans-dimensional travel, but if it is still possible, the information will be written down somewhere in the Vault. You would need to break in there to get it, but it might be possible.”

This seemed quite ironic, as that was what they wanted in the first place. It was also possible they were just saying that so that we would help them, and then say, ‘oh, it wasn’t there? Unfortunate!’ and we’d be no better off. Still, it was worth a try, and so I brought the others in to discuss.

“We might as well try,” I said.

“Yeah, but what if it’s a trap?” Thuzhal responded, and I looked at him, eyes half-lidded. “What?”

“Fine, if we run into any trouble we can’t handle, we get out of there as quickly as possible.”

“Sounds reasonable,” Thuzhal conceded, and Robin had something to say: “Well, from the looks of it, there’s probably something they’re not telling us, but let’s go for it! I’m excited to die!”

I looked at him, and simply stated, “You have problems.”

“I know!” he said cheerfully.

I turned back to Sam and told them what we had decided. They looked relieved, but also a bit scared.

“Yeah, that’s awesome, but-” “Oh great, here we go,” I said, “-um, yeah. So, all of the guards are kinda… linked? So they can trigger the alarm through their minds. You are going to have to take each one out without them alerting the others, though you should have a few seconds before they do so to take care of them, especially because they’re not expecting an intrusion.”

We all thought about this, and after a moment I said, “Okay, I think we can do that.”

They looked even more uncomfortable, and revealed the final bit of information: “Well, yes, um, well… they can activate the alarm even when unconscious…”

It took us a second to absorb this information, but then we exploded. “WE CAN’T DO THAT!” Thuzhal said, “NO, definitely not!” Robin told them, and I replied to them with a “Not gonna happen.” Zer0, on their part, stood still and didn’t say anything, only showing an exclamation mark on their visor.

“I’m sorry, but it’s the only way. We’ve tried to figure it out, but we just can’t. If we try to break the link, they’ll know. If we try to sneak past, they’ll find us. We could  _ try _ a frontal assault and fail, and just… we’ve thought of everything. Think of it, this is the only way to save millions of lives. We live in a dystopia, and the citizens lives’ could be much improved through magic. These are men that  _ chose _ to join the dictator, the only way they are mind controlled is to keep them that way.”

Zer0 was still quiet, and I beckoned them over. The speech charm had long since worn off, which accounted for their silence throughout our visit. They told me that they knew this was the only way, and if we couldn’t handle it, we should just leave and let these people die. After a few minutes of telling me their side, I finally agreed with them. I told the others, who were still arguing with Sam. They got angry at me, which I suppose made sense.

“I know it’s terrible, but we have to do this,” I finished, and they looked kind of shocked and confused, not knowing what to do. It was good they had some kind of morals, but some things were necessary.

“Fine,” Thuzhal said grudgingly, and Robin slowly nodded. I sighed, relieved, and replied, “Well, then, we need to get whatever information we can, so we can pull this off.”

*

We gathered what information we could on the Vault, which seemed to be a part of a bank, situated near the back. It’s entrance was like a large vault door to a bank, as one might expect, except it looked more reinforced and tougher than the other doors. Don’t ask how we got the information we did, it’s unimportant. It was guarded pretty much at all times, and there weren’t any other ways into the Vault, as far as we could tell, so we would have to go in through that big main entrance, which, while also being a sign of a lack of imagination on the part of the creator, would be very hard.

The guards seemed to change at pretty random intervals, and we couldn’t see where they went, other than they would walk away when someone else came by, and just disappear into the darkness. Each guard had a gun, as well as tactical gear similar to that on Earth, and seemed like they knew how to use their gear.

Whenever a person would want to go into the Vault (obviously a person with high enough clearance to do so, so it didn’t happen often), the individual would bring a couple guards, the door would be opened, and the person would enter. From what we understood, the main chunk of the Vault was underground, accessible only from an elevator located just inside the door. 

What made this expedition (would expedition work for this? Maybe heist?) even more impossible was the trigger on the elevator. Nobody could show up without an appointment, not even the ruler, as the elevator had an alarm on it that was, as far as we could tell, impossible to turn off. It was activated whenever the elevator started down, and the appointment was necessary so that nobody could come in uninvited, and they could expect the alarm to go off at a specific time according to the person coming. If anybody went in without permission, again, even the ruler, the elevator would shut down and basically become a coffin, trapping everyone inside to be dealt with.

“It’s actually impossible,” Robin said, looking at the notes we had strewn about the table. He was leaning on it with both hands, studying one card describing the elevator’s alarm. “We can’t get an appointment, and we can’t set off the alarm. We simply can’t do it. Their system is too good.”

“Oh ye of little faith,” I said, smirking. “While certainly not easy, I have an idea. We wait until someone goes down, or we make a reason for someone to go down, and we infiltrate it. The alarm will sound, but it will be expected, and we can do our stuff without setting anything off. In fact, we probably won’t have to kill as many people this way!”

Thuzhal frowned, a look of intense concentration on his face. “There’s no way there isn’t some kind of magical or technological defense that will only allow certain people to enter. We would need to become that person, perhaps all of us, or that person and their guards?”

Zer0 stood back, watching us. I knew they were calculating, taking in all of the information and ideas they could before saying anything. They liked to be brisk and to the point, especially since we had still failed to remove their vocal lock on haiku.

“Thuzhal, if you had some time and knew who would be going into the Vault, could you make a convincing mask of some kind? Possibly one one of us could wear to pretend to be that person?” I asked, looking at the mage.

He looked surprised, and thought for a moment. “Yes, I believe I could. I would need a few days, as well as a good photograph or look at the person first, though.”

I smiled. “No problem,” I told him, as I looked toward the picture of the tyrant masquerading as a benevolent leader posted on the wall.

*

Luckily for us, the leader wasn’t always secluded in his fortress (we learned he was known as the Inhibitor, which made me question how some people thought him benevolent), and occasionally made big speeches, one of which was perfectly timed just 2 days after coming to the world known as Aexriel. This gave Thuzhal plenty of time to memorize his face, and begin construction of a magical mask. We debated upon having Zer0 wear it, as their face was the simplest to hide behind a mask, but were worried that the leader would have to speak, and Zer0’s speech would give us away. In the end, Robin would be the Inhibitor, and the rest of us guards. 

We weren’t exactly sure how we would manage to get into the elevator without being seen, before Robin suggested that we figure out a way to make Zer0’s Decepti0n work for all of us, to some degree. He and I immediately went to work on that, which was much easier than I thought it would be.

Zer0’s ability lay in their suit, which could camouflage itself to pretty much perfectly match its background, though the hologram would be much harder to make. We decided against it, as it was usually used as a distraction, and wouldn’t be useful for the mission. So, using some specific charms and magic, we made some suits that would basically copy Zer0’s power, which made it so we could infiltrate. Problem solved!

The most difficult part, however, proved to be how to get the leader there. He seemed like he wanted to keep his city alive and thriving, so we would need to cause a large enough problem that he would need magic that he didn’t already know to fix it, while also not making it very obvious we were plotting something.

It took us a few days, but finally Sam spoke up with an idea.

“Hey, we already have all these people waiting to revolt, right? But sheer numbers wouldn’t be enough? What if you augmented them with powers, maybe those charms you seem so fond of or something, so that the Inhibitor would have to go into the Vault to figure out how to stop us. 

“I know almost for a fact that none of us have ever dealt with charms before, so he wouldn’t already have that knowledge. They are destructive and powerful enough to keep our people alive, while causing enough of a problem to warrant attention. Also, the Inhibitor knows us rebels exist, but doesn’t know exactly where, so it wouldn’t exactly be surprising that we were uprising, as long as we were careful to make it seem like we made these charms on our own, somehow.”

We all considered this, and then Thuzhal responded with, “Well, he almost definitely knows some magic is being used, as our appearance was probably told to him. He would probably think we’re helping you revolt, and as such would need extra magic knowledge to take down experienced people. This would give us our opportunity, though we need to be seen fighting so that he doesn’t become suspicious as to our location.”

What he said made sense, so we ended up needing the holograms anyway. Oy, vey.

Somehow, we managed to make rudimentary duplicates of ourselves, though they wouldn’t stand up under scrutiny and couldn’t really do that much damage. It was the best we could do at the time, at least.

Finally, it was showtime. Time to show what we had plotted and devised, built and planned. Et cetera. The Street Rats, as they were apparently called, gathered in a large underground room (wow, more underground. The Vault, the room where we met Sam, here, it’s almost like there are things that some people want to keep hidden from others. Huh.) for us to distribute the charms and such. We taught them how they worked as best we could, and hoped that nobody would fail so spectacularly that someone would die, or at least none of the Rats.

They had groups of people, called Rat Packs, which would erupt from the sewers around the city and attack the guards using their magic. A special contingent would directly attack the fortress, to be the primary alert to the leader that something was happening. We had set up a sigil on everyone that, when activated, would send out a signal (psychically, of course) that something had gone awry, and we had to retreat. We didn’t expect this to happen, however, and was just a precautionary measure.


	6. The Inhibitor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The heroes must face off against the most powerful mage in Aexriel: The Inhibitor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WIP!!!!!  
> ROUGH DRAFT!!!!

The Rat Packs were in place, the holograms ready to deploy, and the four of us *special ones* were invisible, watching the Inhibitor, waiting to give the signal. Finally, when he was walking through a courtyard near where the Pack would emerge, I tapped a different sigil on my arm, telling the Army to attack. 

From our high vantage point (we were on a tall skyscraper, kinda suctioned to the wall. It was unnerving), we could see the chaos. Kids of all ages, as well as many adults, poured out of manholes, creating a swarm of magic-enhanced people coming from many points across the city. They were yelling, and causing lots of insanity to occur. They weren’t actually really hurting anyone, especially not civilians, and each Pack were fighting their way toward the fortress, where they would gather and ‘try’ to force their way in, leading into our mission to get the magic books we needed.

Eventually, the second signal came, and it was go time! We saw a bright flash of yellow light in the sky, and pushed off from the building. We free-fell pretty much until we hit the ground, though Thuzhal used a spell that cancelled all of our momentum instantly a few feet before we touched down.

“A bit close there, mate,” I said, and I could only assume Thuzhal looked embarrassed (we were all still invisible, remember?).

“I’m sorry,” he replied, and we continued on our way. We quickly got to the bank, just in time to watch the Inhibitor quickly walk in. He was an imposing individual, about 6 feet tall and muscled, though not overly so. He carried himself like he was on a mission, and everybody had better get out of his way, for their safety. He looked angry and a little worried, and he barked at the guards to get out of the way and it was necessary for him to go down  _ now _ . They quickly told those in command that the leader was coming in and to expect an alarm, and started opening the large Vault door. Zer0 remarked that it reminded him of when his enemy, Handsome Jack, was trying to find the Vault of the Warrior, as well as when his old pals Brick, Lilith, Mordecai, and Roland were searching for the Vault. Roland ended up dying because of Jack, but…um…anyway…

We followed the men into the elevator, being very cautious and stealthy. We flattened ourselves to a corner each (we could faintly see outlines of each other, but only because of our special visors), and noted that the Inhibitor had 3 guards. Using some hand gestures, we decided that Robin, Thuzhal, and Zer0 would take out the guards, while I took out the Inhibitor. That is, until he lifted up his hand and pushed a button held in it.

We felt our suits power down, and all feelings of magic left me. I could usually feel it around me, in the air (where magic functioned), or at least in my body and charms, but suddenly… nothing. The Inhibitor smiled coldly, and said, “Well, did you really expect me to come down here with no defenses? Seriously, did you three plan to stop me with a  _ heist _ ?”

_ Three? _ I thought, confused. Then it dawned on me. The button inhibited magic, but not technology. We hadn’t really messed with Zer0’s suit, so their technology kept them unseen. I looked him straight in the eyes, black strands of hair falling in my face. It had lost its color changing properties, and I hoped it was temporary, as I had gotten used to it as it was. I glared at him, and said, “It was  _ never _ just a heist.”

The others sprang into action, Zer0 cleanly severing the neck of their guard, the one just enough behind the Inhibitor so that he couldn’t see the guard’s head seemingly randomly fly off his body. Robin took his out with similar precision, and Thuzhal slightly less graceful but managing to fulfill his part. Meanwhile, I quickly brought my foot down on the leader’s knee, shattering the kneecap and drawing him to his knees. He let out a gasp of pain, and his eyes widened as he looked at the blood covering his leg.

Then he laughed.

“ _ My _ magic is just fine,” he said, and began to rise into the air. His knee mended itself, and his eyes began to glow.

“And as you can see, you have made me  _ very _ angry.” His face contorted into pure hatred and revulsion, and extremely hot fireballs exploded into his hands.

“Now, DIE,” he said, and a sword burst out of his chest. His eyes bugged, and he sagged, the flames in his hands dying out. Zer0 stood behind him in full view, and he quickly removed his blade from the man’s back. The body crumpled to the floor, lifeless, bleeding out.

“Well, that was easier than anticipated,” I said, breaking the First Law of Adventuring: never say something was too easy.

Immediately, the adverse side effects of my words (or maybe it would’ve happened anyway, who knows?) made itself known. The Inhibitor rose from the floor, contorted and ugly. Half its bones looked broken, even though that shouldn’t have happened from that little fall. 

“You fools,” he said in a rasping, whispery voice. “You have no idea what you’ve done.” He began to rise again, his body contorting further and changing until he looked more like a wolf or other lupine creature with a human skin stretched over it. “You cannot stop me now!” he laughed, and dropped to the elevator floor just as the door opened.

We ran out, Zer0 dropping his Decepti0n to distract the being and get away, ready to attack again. We were in a large, mostly unlit warehouse, or something like one, and tall, thin bookshelves stood neatly in lines, with ladders to reach the higher books. Aisles were labelled with what was in it, alphabetically, one being ‘Apothecary medicine - Azercrom potions’.

“It’s some kind of demon!” Thuzhal shouted, “and can probably be exorcised or something with the right spell! We just need to find out which one!”

The Inhibitor, now bone-white and still like a wolf, except for a bleached human face, slashed at Zer0’s Decepti0n, breaking it and revealing Zer0 themself right behind the wolf. It snarled at them, and swiped one clawed hand at them, who barely dodged the attack.

I realized I should probably look for the right book, as Zer0 was the one best equipped to handle such a beast and was distracting it for us. I ran deeper into the alphabet, stopping when I reached ‘D’ and scanned for ‘De’. After a moment, I found the right aisle, and scanned it for the book I was looking for. About halfway down the shelf, and after a glance at Zer0, who backflipped off of the creature’s back and tried to stab its rear end, to which it replied by sending a fireball burning toward him from its mouth - Note to self, it can still use magic - , I found what I was looking for. ‘Daemons of Aexriel and Beyond’, by Aegrathia Beyoig. I frantically flipped through its pages, my Darkvision allowing me to see them with ease, even in the dim light. I heard a horrible bone-breaking/cracking sound, and looked up.

I watched in horror as the daemon contorted again, and began to shift. It grew to be humanoid, except with a few key differences. It was 12 feet tall, for starters, and its arms were horribly long, going all the way to its ankles. It was still nauseatingly white, and its face was distorted into a smile/grimace. Its spine was clearly visible and - I almost threw up as it reached back and pulled out that spine and held it like a whip.

I felt my magic begin to return to me, which was nice, because it meant whatever the daemon had done wasn’t permanent, though I couldn’t actually do anything magical yet. Instead, I continued my search, hoping that there would be a picture of it that I would be able to identify. The Inhibitor was still fighting Zer0, though the latter was barely holding their own against the hideous beast. As I searched, I heard sickening  _ thwip _ s and cracks of the whip, as well as sounds of annoyance whenever Zer0 turned out to actually be their Decepti0n. 

When I got to the I’s, I got lucky. Apparently, The Inhibitor didn’t have much imagination and simply chose the name of its race of daemons. Obviously, this meant that there was an entry for ‘The Inhibitors’, which showed how they transformed between different forms, and apparently the current one our Inhibitor had taken was its original one, which disgusted me a bit. Their expertise is taking magic away from others, as well as understanding and using foreign magic quickly, which explained how this one was able to take over and take down all the mages so easily.

All of this I absorbed in a few seconds before I found the information I needed to find. The good news was that it was possible to get rid of them. The bad news, however, was-

“Hey, we can’t get rid of it here!” I yelled toward Thuzhal, who was hiding and waiting for his magic to return so that he could help Zer0.

“What do you mean????” he yelled back, to which I threw up my arms and quickly ran over to him.

“We need to go to its dimension to destroy it.”

“Wait, if that book is talking about the daemons of  _ this _ realm, how does that make sense?”

“It’s like a parallel… no, not parallel… um… you know how we know of Tartarus in our world? Like, it’s a real place, but only accessible through portals? It’s like that,” I told him, and his face showed his understanding.

“So how do we get there?” he said, planting his staff against the ground. I should probably mention that our magic had returned, because that is important.

“Welp, we don’t have some of the necessary… ‘ingredients’, if you will, but I think we can make do. My staff should come in handy, though we will need another book, because of course we will. I can get it, I think, but I’ll need you to set it up. Here,” I handed the open book to him, which he immediately started to read, “and I’m going to need you to figure out a way to get this information to Zer0. I don’t know where Robin is, but I’ll find him and we can do this.”

“Okay, but isn’t trying to substitute things in a magical recipe usually a bad idea?” Thuzhal asked me.

“Well, yeah, but I’m sure we’ll be fine. As I was reading it over, I thought about it, and this is our best bet,” I replied, just before running down another aisle, looking for Robin.

I found him in the ‘Frightmares - Frolicking’ section, peering through the bookcases toward the dance between the Inhibitor and Zer0. 

“Hey, Robin. Are you literally just watching them?” I asked him.

“Yeah, look at that. That right there is a masterpiece,” he gestured at Zer0. “The way they barely don’t get hit, weave in and out of that whip’s path, use their Decepti0n perfectly - aesthetic.”

“Yes, yes, yes, Zer0 is awesome. We can appreciate them some other time. Right now, we need to get these ingredients for this portal.”

“Ingredients?”

“Yeah, like candles, chalk, et cetera. C’mon, I see some shelving units over there that either have more books in them, or possibly ingredients.”

We ran over to the units, which, lo and behold, only held books.

“That makes this harder…, “ I said, “unless, of course, there is a well-placed desk over there with all the materials we need in it!”

“That is statistically improbable,” Robin told me.

“I don’t care!” I replied as I ran over to the desk. Somehow, I was right, and in it were some candles, perfect for summoning circles, as well as some chalk to draw said circle and the more…  _ daemonic _ ingredients to make sure we went to the right sub-dimension.

“I have the ingredients!” I shouted, and Thuzhal looked toward me. I pulled out my Improbable Bow (which was quite unlikely) and tied the ingredients to the arrow that appeared. I shot the arrow toward Thuzhal and, improbably, the arrow pulled the ingredients with it, acting as though nothing were attached to it.

Dubiously, he caught it, and started drawing the necessary shapes. He was kinda exposed, and the Inhibitor noticed him.

“NOOO!” it cried, its voice twisted and almost spider-like (ya know, if spiders had voices normally).

Its body convulsed again, shrinking and becoming closer to that of a cat, with extremely sharp claws and powerful legs. It bounded toward Thuzhal, and I ran straight at it, my Vorpal swords already in my hands.

It reached the wizard just before me, though he wasn’t truly defenseless. A blue missile flung itself at the white daemon, who twisted out of the way to avoid it. 

I suppose I should take a moment to explain how Thuzhal was situated. He was on one knee, drawing with his left hand while his right clutched his own staff. He didn’t even look up when he fired the magical missile, which erupted from the top of the staff. Now that that’s out of the way…

It screamed in anger, and then I was on it. I slashed at it with one sword, the other held close to my body for defense. I didn’t expect to be able to damage it, as Zer0’s blade and guns hadn’t been able to pierce its skin, but my sword sank deep into the daemon’s side.

Unfortunately, the wound immediately began to close, sealing my sword inside.

Fortunately, it made the daemon screech in agony and I was able to phase my sword through its flesh. It turned toward me, anger present on its pale, human-like face. I slashed at that face with my other sword, and the daemon swallowed it.

Literally, it just caught my blade in its mouth and  _ swallowed it _ before I could respond. This made me angry, and so I jumped, flipped, and landed on its back. I stabbed downward, tearing another hole in its body, and flipped away before it could retaliate.

We kept up this game of cat and mouse for a few minutes, me barely evading its attacks, it getting increasingly mad. We almost knocked over a bookshelf, at which point I quipped, “these really should be bolted, ya know?” right before getting slammed into it.

“Dude, that really hurt,” I wheezed, but still managed to jump upward and over its head. I landed next to it, and sliced at one of its legs, cutting cleanly through it. The cat-like creature screamed, falling to the side. It only gave me a moment of respite, however, as the elbow and forearm began to grow muscle and sinew, reaching to each other. When they touched, they pulled the forearm back onto the daemon, and the wound fully mended.

“Oh, come on! This  _ totally _ isn’t fair!” I yelled, to which Thuzhal muttered back, “Of course it isn’t. Shut up.”

Just after he said that, he stood up and announced, “I’m done!”

“Great!” I said, flipped onto the Inhibitor’s back, and in one fluid motion grabbed the staff and tossed it at him.

“Slam that onto the ground in the middle of the circle and say, ‘Ooga chaka, ooga chaka, ooga chaka!’”

He did as I asked, a perplexed look on his face. Once he said ‘Ooga chaka’ the final time, a dark, swirling vortex, looking like a slice of the universe (well, not  _ slice _ , per se, but it looked starry) opened, a vacuum-like noise emanating from it. Thuzhal was immediately sucked in, and I lost my balance on top of the creature, falling forward and crashing into the ground on my shoulder.

I felt myself sliding across the floor toward the portal as well, and I panicked, tried to get up, and failed. However, I was able to grab the leg of the Inhibitor and drag it with me, just in case it thought it would be able to get out of this easily.

Just before I fell through the vortex, I saw Robin half running, half being pulled toward it as well, wanting to be useful and join us. He tripped, and his momentum carried him through the portal at the same time as me.

*

I immediately took stock of my new surroundings (as much as I could while holding onto the leg of a horrible daemon, I guess). We were in some kind of wasteland, like ruins of a long-abandoned town in a red desert. I thought it looked similar to what I’d expect an abandoned alien settlement on Mars to look like, although the sky was… weird. It was similar to the stars and view of the sky from Earth, except… it swirled.

It was more like how the vortex looked, swirls of darkness and stars, galaxies spiraling around each other. It was amazing and beautiful, but also terrifying, because we could also see this place’s Sun, the closest star, which was so different from Earth, where it was more of a pastel blue sky and then the bright sun. The combination of stars and… well… Sun unnerved me. But anyway…

The creature snarled, and spoke to us with a strange voice filled with quiet whispers, “You should not have brought me here. Here, I am ALL-POWERFUL!!!! Do you really think I would leave a book that describes exactly how to stop me IN MY VAULT???”

I blinked at him, and simply responded, “Yes.”

He looked perplexed, and then shook his head. “why would I do that?”

“Ummm… you don’t have enough time to look through each and every book for what information it includes?” I asked tentatively.

He cocked his head to the side. “FAIR ENOUGH!!!”

He began to shiver and change again, which still freaked me out. His new form was even more terrifying than his true form, which made me question which form exactly was his true form. He grew to a height of  _ really kdlsafjakg tall _ (I’m sorry, I wasn’t really able to get measurements right then), and started to glow a… Kinda purple? It looked like… a dark light, an oxymoron, a paradox. It was like an LED bulb, except the light was black instead of normal colors. I can’t describe it. Anyway, yeah, he was dark glowing, really tall, and his body was… again, I’m terrible at description! 

Still, I should try.

It was kind of like a bear’s, big and stocky, but the limbs were just… wrong. They were much too long and skinny, and seemed to come to a point, a single dot of matter, perhaps, where it might be conceived an elbow would be. That doesn’t necessarily make sense, as it didn’t for me either. 

And when I say the limbs were long, I mean they were  _ long _ . Like I said, the torso was similar to a bear’s in size, but each limb towered over me, so the whole creature from foot to head was probably over 25 feet tall. The arms went down to its ankles, and its head was… I don’t want to use the word ‘weird’ too much, but seriously. The whole daemon was sickeningly white, and the head was too small. It was probably the size of a human’s, and completely blank. There was no face, no ears, no hair, kinda like a white latex glove stretched over it? If that makes sense?

“Dude, you okay?” I yelled up at him, and he looked at me (well, his head turned toward me). 

“ _ Of course I’m okay. What do you mean? _ ” he asked, confused.

“Well, you’re looking a bit… big. Not in a bad way, of course, but you’re also quite pale. Are you getting enough Vitamin D?” His head cocked to the side, like he was thinking hard.

“You’re also glowing darkly, which, first of all, doesn’t sound right, but it also doesn’t look very healthy. Maybe you also need more magnesium?” I continued.

“ _ No, I’m getting plenty of both. This is just who I am,” _ he responded.

“Oh, yeah, okay. It’s totally fine that you look like that, I’m completely against lookism, I was just worried about you,” I told him.

“ _ Worried… about me? But I’m about to kill you and string up your corpse…“ _

“Yeah, we should talk about that. You probably have a lot of pent up anger and are just trying to express it. However, this way is unhealthy, and won’t help you long term. We can talk about different ways to channel it, as well.”

The others were also looking at me incredulously. I motioned at them to  _ calm down and let me handle this _ . Thuzhal shook his head and looked toward the ground, a small smile on his face.

“ _ Pent… up… anger? _ ”

“Well, yeah, I already mentioned the wanting to kill us thing. You obviously weren’t content in this pocket dimension, or whatever it is, as well, otherwise you wouldn’t’ve taken the time to become a mage and take over Aexriel. I feel you, man, we all have to release it somehow. Might I suggest a safer, better way to do it, like… I’m not sure. Robin, do you know?”

“Uh, um, don’t drag me into… whatever this is,” Robin told me, a slightly scared and questioning look on his face.

“Dude, it’s a therapy session. You never seen one before?” I asked.

“ _ Please don’t stop, this is actually kinda helping, _ ” the Inhibitor pleaded.

“Okay, Inhibitor. Uh, do you have a different name? It might be easier than saying ‘The Inhibitor’ each time I refer to you.”

_ “Oh, yes, it is  _ **_⤪⥀⥩⍃⌱¦ℿ૱ⅇ_ ** .”

I blinked at him. The name was clearly from a different language, and completely unpronounceable. It sounded like someone screaming song lyrics into a vacuum, and then the recording was turned backward and translated 5 times through a terrible translation service, and finally, all the words were mixed up in a blender.

“Well, do you have a more…  _ pronounceable _ name?”

“ _ You may call me Geourge _ ,” he told me.

“Um, okay… Geourge.”

“ _ Thank you, Alushtas. _ ”

“You, uh, know my name? Actually, that’s unimportant. So, we were therapizing you… that isn’t a noun, is it? Whatever. Um, safer ways to take out anger… Do you have someone close to you? Or someone that will listen to you? Because I’ve found that venting can be a good and healthy way to express your feelings. You can get feedback, or even if the other person doesn’t have anything to say, you shouldn’t have to face your burdens alone!”

Geourge smiled at me, and said, “ _ Yes, there is a person I tell my problems to, my adoptive sister. By which I mean I have adopted her as my sister, not… anyway. So yeah, I have that, but I’m still so angry all the time. Life is so stressful, you know?” _

I nodded, and replied, “Oh, yeah, I understand completely. Still, you should tell her more about you, rather than just day to day problems. Also, trauma in your past might have something to do with it, so if you feel comfortable tell her that as well, and she might be able to help you.”

“ _ Okay, I’ll look into that. _ ”

“Awesome, and I can give you the advice I have, but I’m not really suited to this. C’mon, I’m a thief, not a therapist. I’m sorry, but I can’t really help you further. You should see a real one, they’re really helpful,” I told him a little sadly.

“ _ Okay, thank you. Should we get back to Aexriel? _ ” Geourge asked me. He shrunk down, deflating like a balloon, until he was humanoid again. 

“Yeah, we should probably head back. The insurrection is still going on. Sorry about that, they don’t really like your rule and we needed a distraction so we could get you to go down to the Vault.”

“It’s fine, I’m sure we can work something out. It was really an ingenious plan, if not for, ya know, the fact I’m a daemon. Anyway, there’s the portal, let’s go.” His voice was back to normal as well, so he looked for all the world like a normal person.

We started to walk back toward the portal, when a thought hit me.

“Hey, how  _ did _ you know my name?” I asked Geourge.

“A little flower told me you’d be arriving soon, and described what all of you were like. It didn’t tell me about that android, though.” He gestured to Zer0, who tilted their head. The four of us exchanged glances, worried ones, for we knew exactly who he was talking about.

“Was this… flower… small, yellow, and seemingly friendly? And was his name… Flowey?”

He tilted his head, practically mimicking Zer0, and furrowed his brow.

“Yes, I believe so. Do you know this creature?”

I gripped my staff tighter, my face settling into a grimace.

“Unfortunately, yes. He tried to kill us, but we thought we had escaped. We travelled to a different dimension, but evidently, he didn’t stay behind. This will probably end up being a problem, but hopefully he will end up somewhere else and not bother us.” I doubted what I was saying even as I said, it, as, from what I knew, Flowey wasn’t the type to leave well enough alone.

“Well, I hope that goes well for you, but I have a country to run. Enjoy.”

“Uh, you too, I guess. Hey, do you have a book on dimensional travelling and how to control where you go? We’ve been looking for that sort of thing for a while now, and it would be quite helpful if you did.”

He concentrated for a minute, staring at the ground just in front of the portal, and then smiled.

“Yes, I believe I do. I don’t remember all of the books in my Vault, but I do think I took special interest in one like that. I could find it again, no problem. I’d love to give it to you, as thanks for helping me.”

I smiled, as did Robin and Thuzhal, and Zer0 expressed a ‘:)’ on his faceplate. “That would be awesome, thanks!”

We jumped through the portal, experienced the vertigo / disorientation of being in a completely new place, and readied ourselves. Geourge started looking through the shelves, and I cast the spell to dispel the opening. 

After a few minutes, Geourge yelled out, “I found it! It’s right where I left it, right… as… it should be…“ he trailed off, perhaps realizing it was obvious it would be where he left it.

He walked over to us, holding a large tome.

“The information should be somewhere in here, sorry I can’t help you more.”

“Oh, that’s fine. We’ll find it ourselves, it’s okay. Thank you for the help. You should probably go deal with the Rats.”

“Yeah, I should,” he said, “bye.” He ran back to the elevator, and we followed.

“Sorry, we need to leave here as well. We need space to read and find the correct incantation, and this isn’t it.”

“That’s fine.”

The elevator ride back up was silent, but a comfortable silence. Geourge kept the guards from attacking us, and we went back to the hideout while the leader of the Rats and the Inhibitor negotiated.

“So, Thuzhal, do you think you can search this tonight?”

“Yeah, I’ve gotten a little sick of doing this, I’m ready to go home.”

Once in the hideout, Thuzhal immediately started reading the book, eager to be done by the morning. Robin and I got food, and afterward ate, resting ourselves for the next day’s ordeal, whatever it may be.


	7. The Vastness of Reality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the group finally found a way to get home!!!

**15**

The next day, I was startled into consciousness by a loud whoop of victory from Thuzhal.

“Eh, what?” I said woozily, disoriented from being woken from my meditation. I had started about 3 hours previously, for, as I have mentioned, elves need much less rest than humans. I had spent the time before that talking with Sam, who had started negotiations with Geourge. They were working things out, and perhaps magic would be able to be reintroduced to society. So that’s good! I think we’re all caught up to speed now… 

“I found it! Or at least, I think I did. It’s an incantation one is supposed to use to open a portal. We’ll need something from the dimension, probably something small, which will become fuel to direct our gateway to the correct world. As I’m not  _ that _ incredible a mage, I don’t know the technicalities, but still. This  _ should _ work,” he told us.

I nodded my head to the side and replied, “Sure, let’s try it. Might as well.”

We all got up and readied ourselves, gathering whatever items we kept with us rather than in various dimensional boxes. We said our farewells to Sam, who thanked us for our help, as well as Geourge, who did the same. Finally, after the total of about an hour, we were prepared. We went out into a park, where we thought we wouldn’t be bothered. We had no idea if this would work, no idea where we’d end up, or if we’d even survive. But we’d come this far, fighting enemies most of the time, and we weren’t going to give up. So long as there was a possibility of getting home, we were going to do whatever it took.

“Are we ready?” Thuzhal asked us, looking at us. I nodded, Robin gave a weak thumbs up and a nod, and Zer0 displayed a smile. He held up

“Okay, here we go. Cheega, meega, hastalageega. Choogalachaka and bozlaquika! Zeepa deppa doo, bapada, bapada, bapada!”

The ground trembled, and the wind picked up, causing leaves to blow away. We all kept our hands planted firmly on the staff, and, when Thuzhal nodded to me, I grasped the spider on top. Instead of warping us immediately, like normal, the world started to shake even more, and we floated up into the air. As one might imagine, this was quite shocking, though I tried to stay calm. The spider’s hourglass mark started to glow a deep, dark red, which was weird considering the amethyst is blue, but whatever, and the dagger Thuzhal was holding began to become ash, which gathered itself in the spider’s mouth, or seemed to. The dagger was what we chose to be our anchor, for I had others and it was small enough to be easily held. The spider’s eyes also started to glow a strange mixture of colors. It looked both blue and yellow, golden and black, red and green. Perhaps they were strobing much faster than my mind could handle, but whatever the case, that’s how they looked.

A rip in the world, a hole in the universe, an impossibility opened up below us. It was expansive, large enough for all of us to fall in, and what I saw nearly drove me to insanity. Imagine staring into the void, an endless spacetime. All the universes were splayed out before us, each one showing its entire timeline in one vast second, showing how small and insignificant we were, how we are, and how we will be. No matter what we do, no matter how we act, it’s already done, and in the large scheme of things, it doesn’t matter.

But we don’t care about the big scheme of things. We care about the little things, the individuals we can help. We care about our friends, our relationships, our family. The ‘big picture’ may be important, but so are the moments, the days spent together, the trust built between friends.  _ That _ is what kept me sane in that terrible moment.

We fell into it, entire universes surrounding us. As though pulled on a string, we were dragged past them, ones of improbability, where physics didn’t function and science didn’t make sense. The vastness of it almost overwhelmed us, but we continued on. 

Suddenly, one dot, one world, one universe seemed to stand out. It wasn’t actually different from the others, it wasn’t glowing, it wasn’t a different color, nothing was physically changed. Still, I could tell it was the one, it was special. In my heart, I knew what it was. It was home.


	8. The Final Battle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The companions must face off against their final foe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WORK IN PROGRESS  
> ROUGH DRAFT  
> Main Character death (im sorry)

When we reached it, we kinda… It’s hard to describe, especially because I’m not entirely sure  _ what _ happened. I just remember it expanding, the timeline stretching out before us. I think we probably… hit… a part of it, which sent us to that point in the timeline? Anyway, there was a flash of light, and then unconsciousness.

When I awoke, I was staring into the sun. I squinted, and moved my hand up to block the light. It was midday, and as I got up, I saw that Robin and Thuzhal were passed out on the ground. Zer0 was standing, leaning on the staff. I shook off my grogginess, and looked at our surroundings. From what I saw, we were just outside the gates of Calimport, except… 

It was quite obvious we hadn’t arrived the moment after we left, because 1) we left at (I’m pretty sure) early morning, and it was midday now, and 2) the city was covered in vines. I mean,  _ covered _ . The city seemed dead, for I could hear no normal sounds, and vines were overgrowing everything, as though the town had been abandoned for a very long time. 

I woke up the others, who were just as confused as I was. We walked toward the gate, which hung slightly open and sagged with the weight of the creepers.

“I’m going up top to scout,” I said, to which Robin nodded. I grabbed a vine, and started climbing up. About halfway to the top, it started moving, slowly at first, but then picked up speed. By the time I was three quarters up, it was whipping me around, trying to throw me off.

“Killer plant, killer plant!” I shouted, and the others looked up. Thuzhal quickly cast a spell, which caused the vine to stop moving completely, frozen in place. I managed to climb the rest of the way up without an incident, and called down to let the rest know. As I looked across the city, I saw that it wasn’t just the walls and gate, but all of it.

“Uh, hey. Didn’t Geourge mention something about Flowey?” I asked, and Robin and Thuzhal exchanged looks. I don’t mean to exclude Zer0, as it may seem, but they don’t really express much, so there really isn’t much to say.

“Yes, I believe he did. Why?” Robin called up.

“Well, the entire city is kinda, how do I put this, it’s absolutely covered in those creepers. Combined with what Geourge said, I’m inclined to believe we might’ve picked up a hitchhiker. I don’t know how he got here before us, but, uh, it’s definitely not good. Be on your guard.”

They started tentatively walking through the streets, cautious of any movement. I followed from the rooftops, my swords in my hands, ready to slice any moving vines. We made our way through the town, but encountered no one else, reinforcing my idea that it was a ghost town. Eventually, we reached the tavern where we had stolen the talisman from the barbarian all the way back at the beginning. Isn’t it wonderful how fate likes to twist things like that?

Flowey was there, in the middle of a square. The tavern, in comparison, was at one of the corners of it, looking very desolate without any lights on. Anyway, the flower was on top of the fountain, smiling and looking for all the world like an innocent little flower, somehow blossoming even in stone.

“Hiya! What are the odds we’d meet in a place like this?” he said, still smiling.

“Flowey! How on earth - no, how in the multiverse did you get here?” Robin asked, levelling his dagger at the creature.

Flowey’s smile seemed to grow larger and more insane. “Oh, that’s easy! I was watching you from the moment you got to the Underground, and I was amazed at how powerful you seemed! When you attacked me,” -“I think you attacked us first,” I interjected- “Whatever! Anyway, while King Asgore was distracted by the human that usually comes through the Underground, I was able to steal the six human souls! I rushed back, and just managed to follow you guys. However, with my newfound power, rather than ending up wherever that staff took you, I saw all the universes spread out before me, for me to bring under my control!

“I was able to see each universe,” -”You said that”- “and I was curious as to what you were doing. I watched your progress for a while, and decided to go to that worthless Aexriel dimension to see what I could learn. It wasn’t much, but the knowledge I gained helped me to take over this city, and soon, the entire world! My power will only continue to grow, and soon I will be ruler over the entire multiverse! HAHAhAHahaHahahAHahahahahahahahaHAHahAHA!!”

I just stared at him and his hideous grin with an unimpressed look on my face.

“You aren’t going to win this, you know that, right?” I asked him.

He looked surprised. “What? Of course I’m going to win this. Especially with my minions!” Out of the houses came  _ people _ , those who lived here, even Sylvan, that elf that was always trying to one-up me. Probably forgot about him, huh? Well, he’s unimportant, as Robin neatly took him out with a blow to the head from his dagger. They all looked normal, except their eyes glowed green and vines enveloped them. I put away my swords, as they wouldn’t be useful, and instead pulled out my bow. I wasn’t sure exactly how I would use it, since I didn’t want to harm anybody, but I wanted to be useful. 

Suddenly, I remembered that I still had some rubber balls from Earth (don’t ask), and so I rushed to pull them out. As I stuck the points of the arrows into them, I saw the others working together to take down more citizens.  _ Good,  _ I thought,  _ they know what to do _ .  _ Well, of course they do, but whatever _ . I finished what I was doing, and hoped it would work.

I pulled back the string on my bow, lined up the shot, and let it fly. I hadn’t accounted for the weight of the ball, however, and the arrow did not hit the target. Instead, it fell a few feet short of the target, bonking someone else on the head. 

“Vibe check,” I muttered quietly to myself, and tried my best to aim another shot, including the weight of the arrow. This time, I managed to strike the individual I meant to, knocking them to the ground, unconscious (or so I could only assume, as I was not close enough to check). I took a few out this way, but ultimately decided I would be more useful on the ground. 

I made my way down the side of the building, noting that there appeared to be only a couple dozen left. One tried to bite me, a dwarf who I punched in the nose, and I pulled out my swords again. I kept the blades phased, and we made quick work of the ‘vined’.

I breathed heavily, as I was exhausted. “Is-… is that the… gimme a second…… is that the best you’ve got?”

Flowey tilted his head to the side, a thoughtful expression on his cute face. “No, I don’t think it is. Good luck!” More beings burst from the doorways, but these weren’t human. They were similar, sure, but there were… differences. They stood on two legs, seemed to be every color and no color at the same time, and their fingers hardened into points. They wore no clothing, but it didn’t matter, as they were sMoOtH, not even having any hair or facial features (kinda similar to Geourge’s form in his dimension, I guess). 

They screamed, somehow, a horrible noise that set me on edge. They rushed at us on four legs, causing an, “Oh, come on!” from Robin, a sentiment which I strongly agreed with. I lifted my weary arm, determined to go out fighting, when suddenly they were enveloped in glowing purple flames. I looked over to see Thuzhal chanting, his staff planted in the dirt and his eyes glowing a faint blue.

They writhed and contorted, screaming in agony, until they were curled up on the ground. The burning continued until they were piles of ash on the ground, and I looked over at Thuzhal nervously, who had a look of hatred on his face.

“Hey, they’re dead now,” I said, gently nudging his shoulder. The anger left his eyes and he collapsed to the ground. “You good?”

“Yeah, I just hate it when people try to hurt my friends,” he replied, and slowly got up. He faced Flowey and said, with a cold look in his eyes, “That includes you, you overgrown weed.”

Flowey looked surprised at his anger, but quickly regained his smile. “It doesn’t matter. You’ll die all the same. Or maybe, you’ll kill me. In the end, like I said, it doesn’t matter. You’ll be following my philosophy! You will kill me, or be killed! There’s a certain irony to it all!”

“Wow, a flower is talking about philosophy. Not the first time it’s happened, but the first psychopath flower to do so. At least, the first one today. Anyway, good for you, but we don’t have to kill you, necessarily. We could just incapacitate you and, I don’t know, put you in a little pot or something.”

Thuzhal leaned over and whispered something to me, causing me to nod in understanding and say, “Ah, so Thuzhal here has told me that incapacitating you won’t be a thing because of those pesky little SOULS you have, so I guess we will have to kill you. Not every single encounter has to end with death, though.”

Flowey smiled what could probably be best described as the smile one would give an annoying but slightly funny toddler, one that humors the kid while also showing one’s annoyance. “I have the power of  _ five _ human SOULS, which all have tremendous power. Who are you? A mediocre fighter, a thief, a mage who can barely dispel my ink demons which, I can tell you, aren’t that difficult to summon, and the only one with any skill, the robot. Yeah, I know about you, Zer0. You’ve done some amazing things, but when it comes down to it, you’re just a simple machine, ones and zeros, if-then statements. So what, exactly, do you have?”

“Well, we have the power of teamwork and friendship, the latter of which, wait, what? Friendship isn’t an actual power? Oh, come on! Of course we won’t win! What’s that you say? We are actually much more powerful than it seems like we are? Well, that’s true. You aren’t gonna win, my dude.”

Flowey just stared at me. “Nobody said anything to you. Are you okay?”

I smiled, and replied, “Well, I’m not entirely sure, but I don’t think so. Also, buddy chum pal friend buddy pal chum bud friend fella bruther amigo pal buddy friend chummy chum chum pal I don't mean to be rude my friend pal home slice bread slice dawg but I gotta warn ya if you take one more diddly darn step right there I’m gonna have to diddly darn snap your neck and wowza wouldn't that be a crummy juncture huh? Do you want that? Do you wish upon yourself into physical experience with a crummy juncture because friend buddy chum friend chum pally pal chum friend if you keep this up then well gosh diddly darn i just might have to not get so friendly with you my friendly friend pal friend buddy chum pally friend chum buddy.”

Everyone stared at me, and Flowey took a long, slow blink. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Whoa, dude, language! You know, this story is meant for kids!” I said, feeling lightheaded.

“I know Undertale is a game, but this is ridiculous!” Flowey shouted, anger clear on his small, yellow face.

“Ridiculous? I know a thing or two about ridiculous! For instance, thinking that the world isn’t inherently chaotic and gay!”

Without another word, Flowey sent a vine flying at me. I would’ve been dead if not for Zer0’s fast reflexes with their swords. They neatly sliced it open, and the flailing tentacle only managed to push me back a step. Flowey summoned a skull, whose mouth opened and fired a bolt of white energy at me. I jumped and flipped, landing easily on another creeper that had been sent after me. I jumped again, cutting downward through its body. Flowey screamed, and vines thrashed all over the place.

I should probably make sure it is known that these vines are quite wide, or most of them at least. They aren’t dainty little whips, but more like sledgehammers, except… shaped like a whip. Kinda. You get the gist, hopefully.

When I say all over the place, I mean  _ all over the place _ . The courtyard looked like, well, it was covered in thrashing, huge vines. I don’t know how else to describe it. Like I said a while back, I’m not the best at description.

I weaved my way around them, cutting through those I could, making my way toward Flowey. Robin was doing fairly well, at least managing to hold his own, Thuzhal was floating, anger clearly present on his face, and vines were being blasted away left and right. Basically, he was easily the most impressive one there.  _ Oh wait, _ I thought as I slashed through a few more vines, _ we should be working together, huh _ .

“Hey guys, wouldn’t it be easier to, you know, work together? Rather than do this solo?” I shouted.

Robin paused in fighting, almost getting his arm ripped off, and nodded. Thuzhal was too busy being angy and burny to care, but Zer0 immediately broke off from their fight and started cutting a swath of destruction toward Robin. I did the same, cutting and threading my way past the vines, which never seemed to end, toward my thief buddy.

Zer0 and I made it there at about the same time, and we all started making our way toward Thuzhal. It was much easier, for Zer0 and I worked as a unit, while Robin watched our backs to make sure nothing sneaked up on us.

It might seem like I should be writing more for this, but there really isn’t, because who wants me to write for two pages about how I cut vines? It’s pretty simple, and I’m trying to get the point across, not go in depth with subtext.

Anyway, yeah, we cut a path to Thuzhal, which quickly filled in behind us. When we got to him, I saw more clearly that we wouldn’t really be able to help him, as he was trancelike in his anger, and didn’t seem capable of teamwork.

“We should stick together, but Thuzhal seems to be doing fine,” I told Robin and Zer0, who nodded in agreement. We continued to work together, cutting a path toward the flower.

“Oh, no, that isn’t gonna happen!” Flowey said as we started to get close. A couple of vines shifted (wow, so original, I know), revealing twin flytraps. Out of them flew bugs, probably flies, hundreds of them. They blinded us, got in our mouths, pushed us back and away from Flowey.

“Actually, let’s do this differently,” Flowey said mischievously. The vines retracted, disappearing faster than they came. Suddenly, the courtyard was empty, a startling difference to just moments before. Flowey appeared to only be inhabiting the fountain, as even the vines encircling the buildings were gone, while it (the fountain, obviously) was still overgrown. Caught off guard and off balance by the sudden retreat, Robin fell to the ground on his side. Thuzhal realized the vines were gone and drifted to the ground, where he stumbled, looking tired and uncertain.

Wary of what Flowey was doing, I settled into a fighting stance, my blades bared. I walked slowly toward him, never moving out of my stance. When I got within 5 feet of the fountain, a blast of air sent me flying into the side of the tavern and my swords clattering to the sidewalk.

“Dude,” I wheezed on the ground, “ow.” I slowly got up, retrieved my swords, and hobbled over to Robin.

“So… what else do you have for us?” Thuzhal said, leaning against a house.

Flowey thought for a moment, then his smile grew larger.

“I know! How’s this?” Skulls similar to the previous one floated up from behind the fountain, firing once each in a pattern I didn’t understand. I broke the window behind me and jumped through to avoid them, but Robin wasn’t so lucky. I heard a grunt of pain, and then he appeared through the window, clutching his arm.

“Are you okay?” I asked him breathlessly, and he nodded, his face white. I handed him some bandages, which he wrapped around his bicep.

“Ready?”

“No, let’s do this.”

We jumped out and through the window, and ran at Flowey. Zer0 noticed what we were doing (they had done something similar to myself to a different window) and followed us, running toward the flower with an angry expression on their faceplate. Ignoring a weak, “No!” from Thuzhal, I jumped, spinning, prepared to cut the yellow creature in half. Just as my blade was about to slice through a flower, I froze in midair, no momentum, no movement - nothing.

The same thing happened to Robin, but Zer0 was able to throw out their Decepti0n, fooling Flowey into holding that instead of them.

“You really think you can just  _ stab _ me to death? Bitch, please. I’m more powerful than that.”

“You  _ really _ gotta stop with that language, my guy,” I said through my teeth. We dropped to the ground, myself landing in a crouch, Robin on all fours. I flung my arm toward Flowey, a hidden dagger sent flying at him, which promptly froze and dropped to the ground.

“Welp, I had to try,” I said grimly. 

Thuzhal let out a strangled yell, but I wasn’t able to turn my head to see why. Flowey grunted, and I dropped to the ground. I whipped my head back to the mage, who looked angry, but also terrified. He was leaning back, bracing himself on his back leg, his front leg extended, pointing his staff straight at the flower, the top of it glowing pink. Flowey looked shocked and angry at whatever Thuzhal was doing, and the ground around the wizard closed like a bear trap around him.

“Thuzhal!” I shouted, scared. I ran toward the trap, intent on breaking it open somehow, but then it shattered open, Thuzhal standing in the middle. His eyes were glowing golden, and his robes were floating as though caught in an invisible wind. A tight expression of rage was clear on his face, and when I glanced at Flowey, his mouth was open, his expression aghast.

“What-what are you?” he asked Thuzhal, who simply hovered into the air, his staff loosely held at his side. Flowey tried to stop him again, breathing flames disproportionately far, enveloping our friend. We could only stop and stare, for this was clearly  _ not _ something we could be a part of, and we couldn’t help him.

The flames surrounded him, but the pink shine of his staff and the golden glow of his eyes were still visible through the red and yellow. With a yell, a wall of air pushed the flames back until they hit Flowey, who cursed again and stopped trying to flame Thuzhal. However, our attention was drawn to the mage.

He was still floating in the air, face set with determination. Except… he wasn’t a  _ he _ anymore, or so it appeared. His… her… face was more ethereal, incredible, her long hair just as long as before, but no longer tied into a ponytail, but let out, flowing behind her. Her thick robes were burnt, which she seemed miffed about, but they were mostly fine.

“My name,” she said dramatically, “is Mila Zolsaha, and you, Flowey, are dead. No one, I mean  _ no one _ , hurts my friends.”

She flew at Flowey, who ducked behind the fountain.

“Oh, so that’s how it’s gonna be?” She pointed her staff at the fountain, blasting it apart with an energy strike. Flowey was sent flying back, surprised and scared. Then, his face twisted into a clear expression of fury, and he floated up into the air.

“Why do  _ they _ get to fly?  _ I  _ don’t get to fly,” I muttered, and Robin lightly punched my arm.

“So we have to do this the hard way. Okay,” Flowey said, “I can play this game.”

He started to glow, softly at first, then very brightly, until it was impossible to look at him. When the light faded, Flowey had also… changed. He looked similar to Toriel from the Undertale world, except more masculine, more menacing, and with horns coming from his head.

“AHAHAHAHAHAHHHAAH, it’s so nice to finally have a real body again! And dead, me? No, I, A s r i e lD r e e m u r r, am a GOD! And now, the first course of action… killing you pesky insects!” He raised his hands and laughed, shaking his head. Suddenly, a skull shot up and fired at me. I dodged to the side, and ran toward him.

“Alushtas, you can’t help!” Mila shouted at me, “You have to get out of here!”

“No! I’m not leaving you!” I shouted back, determined to do whatever I could.

Mila swore, which shocked me, as I had never heard her do so before, and quickly started on some magic. Flowey, or Asriel, as he had said, sent down a heavy sword from the sky, racing toward the mage. It hit an invisible shield and broke, the pieces falling to the ground. She finished her incantation, and suddenly Robin, Zer0, and I were in the guild.

“What? No! We need to get back there!” I yelled, and Robin nodded. We ran out of the building, and swiftly scaled it. When we got to the top, I looked over the city. It looked very calm and still, except for one area.

“There!” I said quickly, and pointed to the commotion. There were flashes of light, and sometimes one of the magic users would come into view for a second. With a start, I remembered.

“The citizens! They’re still there!” I told Robin, and walked back, preparing to run and jump to the next rooftop. Just before I started sprinting, the air above the nearby roofs shimmered and all those we had defeated appeared, seemingly teleported to safety.

“At least there’s that, but Mila needs our help!” I ran and jumped, barely clearing the space between buildings. I stumbled slightly, and Zer0, who had leaped the gap effortlessly, steadied me.

“Thanks,” I said to him, smiling slightly, and they displayed a heart emoticon. Robin rapidly followed, and we continued on our way.

We made our way back to the intersection, where Asriel and Mila still flew, striking each other quickly, then receding. Suddenly, Mila shot up into the air, at least a hundred feet above us. Even though she seemed to be speaking at a normal talking level, we could still easily make out her words: “What are you doing? I told you you can’t help here! Go!”

“No, we aren’t leaving you! We can help!” I shouted back, desperate to stay.

“I  _ really _ can’t argue right now, but I promise, you can’t!” she told us, just as Asriel shot up as well. They started to fight again, their colors blending together as they danced an intricate dance of death, until we couldn’t see who was whom.

“I still want to help,” I told Robin, who agreed. “But what can we do?”

He sighed, and looked down. “It might be best to just leave. Sometimes, when we really can’t do anything, it’s better to not get in the way and make those that  _ can _ make a difference worried about whether we’re safe. I made that mistake a long time ago, and… “ He looked despondent, remembering a worse time “... and now I don’t have one of my closest friends…” He broke off, his arms shaking. I tried to comfort him, but he shrugged me off.

“I’m sorry, Robin, if you ever want to talk about it, we’re here to listen.”

“N-no, it’s fine, we just need to get going right now.” He wiped away the tears that were forming on his cheeks and cleared his throat. “That was a long time ago, and we need to worry about the present. Let’s go.”

We started to walk to the edge of the roof, but then, all of a sudden, we found ourselves on a hill.

“Wha-?”

“Mila must have noticed us not moving and sent us here so we didn’t interfere,” I inferred.

“Well, I hope she’s okay.”

“Yeah, so do I.”

We sat down and watched the lightshow, for we weren’t far from the city. We seemed to be on the opposite side from where we originally went into the city, and as there was nothing we could do to help, we might as well have watched. They continued in their dance, with sudden flashes of light and energy lighting up the sky. At one point, Asriel seemed to score a strong hit against Mila, for she went flying through the air. She regained herself, and flew back into the fray. 

After about 15 minutes of this, there was a sudden, bright flash of light that blinded us. We heard a faint “Noooooooo!” from Asriel, and when we regained our sight, the sky was empty of mages.

We ran down the hill, intent on finding out the result of the fight. We got to the city and ran inside, tearing through the streets.

“Wait!” I puffed, and we paused. “We… we should go on the roofs so that we can more easily see where they fell.”

“Good idea,” Robin replied, and we ran to the nearest building. As we started to climb, I could’ve sworn I heard a ‘Why do we always have to go on the rooftops?’ from Robin, but it could’ve also been my imagination. 

We ran across the rooftops, avoiding those that lay sprawled on them. They looked fine, and the vines that covered them looked dead and withered, which I took as a good sign.

I found Asriel first. He was on a rooftop, which made me think that it was a good idea we had decided upon travelling across them. His fur was burnt, his clothes destroyed. His body was ravaged by open wounds and burns like from lightning, and it was clear he was dead, so that was good.

We continued, looking for Mila. It took us a while, but… we found her.

She was lying in the street, and she looked barely better than Asriel. Her skin was covered in burns, and her face was a horror show. With a gasp, I realized she was still alive. She tilted her head and seemed to look straight at me, though her eyes were milky and unseeing.

“Mila?” I said, horrified. She smiled slightly, and very quietly asked, “What happened to Asriel?”

“Don’t worry, he’s already dead. I can go get a healer, you’re going to be okay. Robin, stay here.” I quickly sat down cross-legged and put her head in my lap.

“No! Alushtas, I’m not going to survive. I’m sorry I had to-” She hacked, looking pained “-I had to hide who I was. I had to, or I thought I had to. Now I realize I didn’t. I am sorry.”

“No, it’s okay, you’re going to be fine. Zer0, go get someone!” The robot ran off, against Mila’s wishes.

“I’m serious, I’m going to die. I’m just glad… I’m glad I was able to be useful.” She smiled, the area around her eyes crinkling, “And now, I can die happy. Go, take care of the citizens. Tell them the truth. Mourn me if you must, but move on eventually. Thank you for giving me a purpose.”

“Mila… no…” I sobbed, as her head went limp in my hands. My head sagged, tears pouring down my face, my eyes closed. I sat there for a long time, until Robin put his hand on my shoulder. I opened my eyes, and reached down to close Mila’s.


	9. The Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final pages of the story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WIP  
> ROUGH DRAFT

We had a small funeral a few weeks later. The three of us, Robin, Zer0, and I were there, as well as a few of Robin’s and my friends.

“We’re here to celebrate the life of Mila Zolsaha. She… she was one of my closest friends and a great ally. When we first met her, she was on Earth, waiting for someone who could help her get-” My voice cracked, “-home. Then we came, and she didn’t trust us at first. But she knew we were her way back, and so she joined us. As we travelled, we grew closer, until we were truly friends. She sacrificed herself for us, for everyone, so that Asriel couldn’t take over. We should remember her as she was, a mage, an ally, a friend.” We had decided not to mention that she was trans, for that didn’t matter. She was our friend, and she was a woman the entire time we knew her.

After the service, Robin came over to talk to me privately.

“Before we came here, Mila… talked with me. She told me about where she came from, and how she got to Earth. While it is true she broke a statue of the group’s god, it’s more about the reason. They were apparently very transphobic, and when she was experimenting, trying to change her sex, she broke the statue, which was the last straw. It didn’t help that she’s - she was - an aasimar, which aren’t trusted very much as it is. Other than that, I think you knew her well.”

“She… she seemed much more powerful in that final battle than previously. Was she… holding herself back?”

“Yeah, she told me… as long as she wasn’t able to express herself, as long as she wasn’t able to  _ be _ herself, she wouldn’t be as powerful.”

“Why didn’t she tell me?” I asked, barely keeping myself from crying.

“She - she didn’t know how you’d react. She wouldn’t have told me except she felt like she needed to tell someone before she died, and… other than that, I don’t know why. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. She wouldn’t want us to wallow. She told us to move on, and I will eventually. But I’ll never forget her, or her sacrifice. She deserves nothing less.”

“She told me the community she was a part of. We should go there, tell them what she did, how wonderful she was. I’m prepared to take every single one of them down if I have to, to avenge the pain she went through.”

“Sounds good. Where is it?”

Robin shifted, uncomfortable. “It’s near Ten-Towns, in the Spine of the World. They wanted to be separate from people, for reasons I don’t quite know.”

I started, surprised at how far we would need to go. I should’ve expected it; aasimars, from the little I knew of them, weren’t accepted and so would want to not be around a lot of people, like in Calimport.

“Wait, but why would she want to try to go back in, if they were being transphobic?”

Robin shrugged, a little disturbed. “Either she wanted to teach them a lesson, which I doubt, or something else was up. Maybe she was trying to change her form, but it instead forced her into that male body and brought her across dimensions? I really don’t know. It doesn’t make sense, but she didn’t tell me.”

I looked to the ground, thinking about it. After a moment, I lifted my head. “Let’s go. She deserves this. She deserves for us to tell them how much of a hero she was, the sacrifice she made. They deserve to know the person they kicked out, to be shown their own folly.”

Robin nodded gravely, and we left the room.

*

**_Outside the city, the hole in the world shimmered. Out of it floated a shadowy, triangular figure. The figure turned back to the portal, and spoke in a distorted voice: “Good, good. It’s almost ready.”_ **


End file.
